Report: FirstEnergy Seeks a Subsidized Turnaround
FirstEnergy: A Major Utility Seeks a Subsidized Turnaround (pdf) By Tom Sanzillo, Director of Finance and Cathy Kunkel, Fellow Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis
Sammis Plant
IEEFA Research
More News and Commentary
IEEFA update: Bailing out Ohio’s nuclear and coal plants unnecessary for supply or rate stability
But $300 million annual charge would be bonanza for FirstEnergy Solutions
(IEEFA U.S.) – A bill before the Ohio General Assembly (HB 6), aimed at rescuing FirstEnergy Solutions’ economically uncompetitive aging nuclear and coal-fired power plants is misguided, according to a briefing note released by the Cleveland-based Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA). The briefing note: Bailout Bill a Bonanza for FirstEnergy Solutions, may […]
IEEFA Ohio/Pennsylvania: Bracing for Economic Fallout From Failing Power Plants
Now Is the Time to Plan for Transition
Time has borne out what we said in a report we published in 2014 arguing that FirstEnergy was in financial trouble and that its strategy of seeking bailouts from customers might not be enough to turn around the company’s flagging fortunes. This excerpt from that report—“FirstEnergy: A Major Utility Seeks a Subsidized Turnaound”—summarizes our assessment: […]
A Darker Day Has Just Dawned for Two Long-Outdated Ohio Power Plants
June 1 Marks the Start of a New Year in PJM Capacity Markets and an Abrupt 70% Drop in FirstEnergy’s Revenues on Selling Generation Capacity from Its Sammis and Davis-Besse Power Plants
It came as quite the paradox when CEO Chuck Jones announced in April that the company’s Sammis and Davis-Besse plants had “contributed to” first-quarter earnings. After all, FirstEnergy had been trying to get Ohio state officials to go along with a consumer-financed bailout of these failing assets—all part of a corporate scheme our research has […]
FirstEnergy’s Pitch for an Ohio Subsidy Isn’t in Its Customers’ Best Interests
Change is Coming to the Electricity Industry as Coal-Fired Generation Stands to Get More Expensive
FirstEnergy Corp.’s proposed Power Purchase Agreement to commit its customers to pay for electricity generated by WH Sammis—an old coal-fired power plant in Stratton—might help FirstEnergy but it isn’t in the best interest of its ratepayers. If the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio approves the proposal, the company would be guaranteed a profit on the […]
Fury in Cleveland Over FirstEnergy Rate Plan
John Funk of the Cleveland Plain Dealer does yeoman’s work today in coverage of a hearing last night over FirstEnergy’s plan to put ratepayers on the hook for its flagging business model. Funk describes a five-hour hearing at which most of the 70 people who testified before the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio expressed opposition […]
Ohio: The Swing State for Presidential Elections, and National Energy Policy Too
Every four years, Ohioans brace for the presidential election. Ads flood the airwaves, yard signs sprout like daffodils, and it seems presidential candidates (of all stripes) appear at every Labor Day parade, community event, and pancake breakfast in the state (for a fun way to see what it’s like to live in Swing State Hell, […]
With CEO’s Abrupt Departure, FirstEnergy Gets a Second Chance
It’s the end of a troubled era for FirstEnergy Corp. with the sudden departure of CEO Tony Alexander, who presided over years of poor financial performance and bad policy decisions at one of the biggest electricity companies in the U.S. The good news is that Alexander’s departure—couched by FirstEnergy as a “retirement” at age 62, […]
IEEFA update: Bailing out Ohio’s nuclear and coal plants unnecessary for supply or rate stability
But $300 million annual charge would be bonanza for FirstEnergy Solutions(IEEFA U.S.) – A bill before the Ohio General Assembly (HB 6), aimed at rescuing FirstEnergy Solutions’ economically uncompetitive aging nuclear and coal-fired power plants is misguided, according to a briefing note released by the Cleveland-based Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA). The briefing note: Bailout Bill a Bonanza for FirstEnergy Solutions, may […]