Southern California ratepayers are paying about $500 million less in costs for the premature shutdown costs of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) than plant owner Southern California Edison had sought in a settlement agreement, according to the company’s latest filing with the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC).
The commission announced in April the reopening of the settlement, which resulted in state ratepayers shouldering $3.3 billion of the $4.7 billion cost to shutter the plant. The settlement was reached two years after closed-door conversations between then-CPUC President Michael Peevey and then-SCE executive Stephen Pickett at a meeting in Warsaw, Poland. CPUC fined SCE $17 million in December 2015 for the company’s failure to report the ex-parte communications, and state Attorney General Kamala Harris has opened a criminal investigation against Peevey.
SCE claims it has taken action to reduce customer costs by $500 million, including a recovery from its insurance provider and procurements from the plant’s nuclear decommissioning trust fund. The company expects further ratepayer cost reductions from nuclear fuel sales, along with a potential award from a lawsuit against Mitsubishi, the Japanese manufacturer that supplied the steam generators that led to the plant’s 2013 shutdown. Any potential cost recovery would reportedly be split evenly between customers and SCE.
