Energy Department scraps millions in fees for nuclear loan guarantee
Source: Washington Examiner
Developers of a Georgia nuclear project didn't have to pay millions of dollars in fees designed to prevent risk for taxpayers when it secured $6.5 billion in loan guarantees from the Energy Department in February, the agency confirmed Tuesday to the Washington Examiner.
The DOE calculated a zero dollar "credit subsidy fee," which protects taxpayers if developers default, for electric utility Georgia Power -- a subsidiary of Southern Co. -- and Oglethorpe Power Corp. to spur completion of two large, next-generation nuclear reactors at the Vogtle power plant in Waynesboro, Ga. Energy & Environment Publishing's Greenwire first reported the story.
Dawn Selak, a spokeswoman with the DOE's loan program office, said the agency calculated little risk of default based on a methodology devised by the White House Office of Management and Budget.
“These calculations are made using a standard methodology, consistent with guidelines followed across the federal government. In this case, it should be noted that the Vogtle project sponsors are well-established, sizable companies that are already heavily invested and wholly committed to the project," she said in an email.
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Autumn Hanna, senior program director with spending watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense, called the move "absurd."
"If there is indeed zero risk, then they should not need a federal loan guarantee," she told the Examiner.
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Georgia Power has stood by the project despite delays — the reactors are 21 months behind schedule — and cost overruns of $1 billion that now put the project's cost at an estimated $15.5 billion.
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Read more: http://washingtonexaminer.com/energy-department-scraps-millions-in-fees-for-nuclear-loan-guarantee/article/2547590
More subsidies for a nuclear boondoggle.
This should have been cancelled.
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