Florida Court Blocks Push to Break Electricity Monopolies
MIAMI -
Florida’s top court ruled against a proposed constitutional amendment that would have allowed customers to pick their electricity provider, threatening monopolies held by NextEra Energy Inc. and Duke Energy Corp.
In a ruling Thursday, the court said the petition’s language is “misleading” and doesn’t comply with requirements to be included on the 2020 ballot. The measure’s sponsor, Citizens for Energy Choice, said the move ends the initiative.
“While we were confident in our plan to gather the remaining signatures required, we cannot overcome this last obstacle,” the group’s chair, Alex Patton, said in a statement.
The proposed measure was one of several efforts underway to deregulate U.S. electricity markets. Earlier this week, two Virginia state lawmakers unveiled a bill to allow residents and businesses to pick their electricity provider, threatening Dominion Energy Inc.’s longstanding local monopoly. And in Arizona, where Arizona Public Service Co. has long reigned, regulators are considering a similar move.
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Ireland goes 25 days without using coal to generate electricity
DUBLIN - The island of Ireland has gone a record length of time without using coal-fired electricity generation on its power system, Eirgrid has confirmed.
The all-island grid operated without coal between April 11th and May 7th – a total of 25 days, it confirmed. This is the longest period of time the grid has operated without coal since the all-island electricity market was introduced in 2007.
Ireland’s largest generating station, Moneypoint in Co Clare, uses coal, as do some of the larger generation sites in Northern Ireland.
The analysis coincides with the European statistics agency, Eurostat publishing figures showing annual CO2 emissions…