Public Benefits Fund versus Footing the bill for Utilities

Senate Bill 992 passed out of the Senate Energy committee. SB992 is the Senate Energy Bill and includes language from SB 1186, sometimes called the "FP&L Bill", which repeals the RPS and replaces it with a 3-year, 700MW goal for utilities which would allow them to pass the construction costs back to their ratepayers. This has not passed yet, but probably will, so all of us ratepayers can expect to foot this $4.2 billion deal. What will this mean to ratepayers? Each one of us will have to pay approximately $468 (in total) to build 700 MW for the utilities. This will probably work out to $18 a year for the next 25 years, and then we still don't even know how much more the utilities will charge us for "their" green power.. it is "theirs" after all since we are not benefiting with financial savings on our electric bills.

Yes, the concept of a Solar Energy Public Benefits Fund is so outrageous to those in power this year.. they make statements like ".25 a month is a tax, and we can't tax citizens in a recession." Well-- what would .25 added to every ratepayers utility bill add up to? A whopping $3.00 a year, and it would put $30 million into a fund that would be used to pay people (NOT UTILITIES) for incentives to be able to afford to put solar on their roofs, and REDUCE their monthly utility bills. Instead, the legislature wants us to pay $18.00 a year to build solar farms for our utilities. What are they thinking in Talahassee?? Oh, I guess they're not.