By WAYNE GREENE Senior Writer on Jun 30, 2008, at 4:08 PM Updated on 6/30 at 4:08 PM
WAYNE'S WORLD
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The Corporation Commission's report on undergrounding electrical wires is bad news and the commissioners need to fight back.
The staff report uses absurd numbers to scare ratepayers away from the idea of more aggressive burial of wires.
The report sounds like it advocates more line burial, but, read carefully, it advocates nothing new.
First, it says "lateral" lines, those that distribute power in neighborhoods, should be buried in areas of new construction. Nothing new there at least in this part of the state. AEP-PSO has been doing that for some time.
What about the older neighborhoods? Read this portion:
"Various neighborhoods have asked for the distribution lines to be placed underground. Typically, the electrical utilities oblige when all or a super majority of residents request the burial. Utilities, however, often decide against burial when a vocal minority opposes the effort. Staff recommends requiring electrical utilities to bury lateral distribution lines in exiting neighborhoods when a majority of property owners request it and are willing to pay for it."
So, new neighborhoods get their lines buries as always, but we're asked to pay for burying out lines.
The buried lines would result in lower costs to every ratepayer because the next time an ice storm rolls through, the buried lines don't have to be replaced.
So, it's bad logic to require the individual neighborhoods to pay those costs.
The commission members need to send their report writers back to the drawing board.
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