Who pays — ratepayers, stockholders, equipment manufacturers or insurers — is expected to be a long and thorny dispute before state and federal regulatory agencies as well as in the courts.
On the eve of legislative hearings Tuesday on the issue, the utility offered its 4.9 million customers a preview of its point of view in an advertisement published in the Los Angeles Times.
Closing the power plant is in the "best interests" of customers, it said, and ratepayers should be prepared to pitch in. The company discovered that hundreds of new steam generating tubes were wearing out, and it determined that keeping the plant open till the problem was resolved would be too costly.
"[I]f a utility asset must be retired before the end of its expected life, the utility recovers from customers its reasonable investment costs," Edison wrote.
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