TXU “We will shut down power. oops we didn’t mean that”
Star-Telegram.com | 04/07/2007 | TXU apologizes for PUC filing
The letter, sent to the PUC on Monday by TXU Wholesale Chairman Mike McCall, came as the company jousted with regulators over $210 million in proposed penalties levied in March for allegedly manipulating the Texas power market in the summer of 2005. McCall wrote that if the company and PUC couldn’t come up with rules governing how much the company can be paid for supplying peak power, TXU would have to consider telling the state’s power-grid operator that it might retire or mothball generating plants.That prompted a sharp reaction from key legislators and consumer advocates, who accused the company of threatening to withhold power when it was needed most, an act that would likely raise prices significantly or cause electricity shortages and blackouts.
Under the rules governing the state’s electrical-power grid, generators must provide advance notification of their intent to shut down a generator, and they must keep a generator working, for suitable compensation, if the grid operator deems it necessary.
McCall said in a statement Friday that “TXU apologizes for creating any perception of threatening to shut down power plants in Texas.” He said the company was withdrawing the letter and “will resubmit a more appropriate document” after consulting with TPG and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., the investment groups that are seeking to buy TXU in a record $45 billion deal.
Of course they meant it. They just didn’t expect to get called on it so they are backpedaling as fast as they can now. This is a company that has no problems raising prices (not because their costs rose, just to make a higher profit) when they know it will hurt people the most and we are supposed to think that they suddenly grew a conscience. It sounds completely true to form that they would feel totally justified telling the Public Utility Commission that they would shut off power as a threat. I suppose it is good they backed down but I think it is just more of the same from TXU.
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Filed under: TXU, public utility commission, texas
TXU “We will shut down power. oops we didn’t mean that 
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