UTILITIES

PUC OKs $4-Billion Recovery Costs for San Onofre: The California Public Utilities Commission approved the basis for Southern California Edison Co. and San Diego Gas & Electric Co. to recover costs of its investments in the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station and other fixed costs. The commission approved a compromise proposal by Commissioners Henry M. Duque and P. Gregory Conlon that resembles a settlement reached between Edison and the PUC’s division of ratepayer advocates in 1994, which a judge rejected last year. The decision came in the general rate case in which Edison’s base revenue requirement, including the cost of San Onofre, was set at nearly $4 billion, about $9 million less than the utility had sought. Edison expressed disappointment at the decision; consumer advocates decried it as costly to ratepayers.