O
n Election Day, Florida voters overwhelmingly approved Amendment 1, the proposal that created a permanent source of funding for environmental conservation. The outcome of this vote demonstrated the importance Floridians have placed on sustainability and the environment.
On Tuesday, state regulators on the Public Service Commission completely ignored those priorities when they voted to slash Florida’s energy efficiency standards for Florida’s utility companies by more than 90 percent. The commission also decided to eliminate Florida’s solar power rebate programs by the end of 2015.
According to the Tampa Bay Times, these votes by the commission mirrored proposals presented by Florida energy giants Duke Energy Florida, Tampa Electric and Florida Power & Light. The companies claimed the energy efficiency standards and solar rebate programs were too expensive and those high costs would be passed on to ratepayers.
By fighting the expansion of solar energy in Florida, these major utility companies are taking a page out of the Koch brothers’ playbook. In states like Oklahoma, Ohio and Arizona, political groups supported by the Kochs have spent vast sums of money on anti-solar campaigns. Energy corporations often refer to renewable energy programs and efficiency standards as “disrupting factors.” They claim such initiatives “disrupt” their environmentally harmful and unsustainable yet massively profitable business model. However, the standards and solar rebates do not seem to have taken a toll on these companies’ bottom lines — in the third quarter of 2014 alone, Duke Energy earned $1.3 billion in profit. Clearly, continuing the relatively modest energy efficiency programs of the Sunshine State would do little to threaten the financial stability of these energy giants.
The Times also quoted PSC chairman Art Graham as saying he was concerned “about how some of the low-income people would participate” in the solar rebate program.
If chairman Graham is truly concerned about the interests of low-income Floridians, the solution would be to support an expansion of the solar rebate program, not a vote to eliminate it.
This is far from the first time the PSC has handed out favors to the Florida energy industry. Last year, the commission approved Duke Energy’s construction of a new, $1.5 billion natural gas power plant in Citrus County.
The commission may see legal challenges to its votes last week by environmental groups, which claim that the PSC violated state law by failing to maintain energy efficiency requirements for Florida’s utility companies.
Ivan Penn of the Times wrote that, after eliminating the solar rebate programs, the commissioners of the PSC agreed to “hold workshops on ways to improve solar energy in the Sunshine State.”
This is the way energy policy works in Florida: The corporate interests get everything they want, and Florida voters concerned about sustainability and the environment get “workshops.”
[A version of this story ran on page 6 on 12/1/2014]
