Readers React: Edison shouldn’t pay dividends while its customers cover for San Onofre

To the editor: Last month, Southern California Edison announced it would pay a quarterly dividend to its shareholders in October. So why should ratepayers be covering most of the $4.7-billion cost of decommissioning the San Onofre nuclear plant? (“Will California revisit the San Onofre settlement?,” Sept. 12)

If things are really so bad at Edison that it needs customers to pay for closing the plant, the investor-owned utility shouldn’t be paying any dividends for years to come. The California Public Utilities Commission needs to justify why the settlement dividing up the cost between Edison and ratepayers should not be revisited, reopened and all costs reassigned to Edison.

And what about the PUC’s approval for the new rate plan that penalizes those who conserve? Have you looked at your bill lately? I’m paying more now than I did when Enron was manipulating the market via transmission lines.

Or is it that Edison sees the handwriting on the wall? Consumers are switching to solar panels in droves. Could it be that the PUC is engaged in protectionism by raising the rates on the rest of us in order to protect the Edison’s investors?

Kimberlyn Hearns, San Bernardino

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To the editor: A better solution to the state’s future electrical energy needs would be reported in an article entitled, “Will state revisit reactivation of San Onofre?”

The decision to deactivate San Onofre and lose about 2,200 megawatts of carbon-free, reliable electricity will require thousands of wind turbines over many square miles of land. It would seem that the $4.7 billion spent to clean up the site could be put to better use in replacing the Mitsubishi steam generators with proven nuclear technology, currently used in hundred of nuclear sites around the world.

Reactivating San Onofre would help us meet the carbon dioxide reduction targets mandated by the Environmental Protection Agency. And the ratepayers would get something for their money instead of just a stretch of beach.

Gordon Osborne, Woodland Hills

The writer is a retired power engineer with the L.A. Department of Water and Power.

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