Big Oil Ramps Up Its Fight Against Nuclear Power
The U.S. oil industry’s lobbying arm is waging a political war against state subsidies for nuclear power, according to a Monday Axios story.
The American Petroleum Institute (API) is opposing attempts by state legislatures to bail out struggling nuclear power plants. The trade group said these attempts amount to de-facto energy subsidies that distort the market.
“When the government picks winners and losers in the energy markets, consumers pay the price,” Michael Tadeo, a spokesman for API, told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “Subsidizing nuclear power generation would raise energy costs and deny consumers the benefits of clean-burning, affordable natural gas.”
“Moving forward, API will continue to vigorously oppose efforts to skew the energy markets by propping up uncompetitive nuclear generation,” Tadeo said.
Six states have shut down nuclear plants in the past couple of years, and more plants facing challenging economic conditions, placing them at risk of imminent retirement.
Illinois and New York passed laws to keep reactors afloat by offering them credits for generating electricity without producing carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. States including Ohio, Pennsylvania and Connecticut are considering similar proposals, but API has fought many of them.
