I'm Cool With A Rate Increase For My Power Company... Under These Conditions

Ameren wants more money for less-dependable power? Nah. But here's an alternative...

Acknowledging that Ameren has a monopoly over vast swaths of Missouri and that we Ameren customers enjoy the electricity we consume,

and,

Considering Ameren’s recent request to the Missouri Public Service Commission for a 15% rate increase,

and,

Considering our National Energy Emergency,

I propose the following.

Ameren should be granted this rate-hike, if and only if the company agrees to these four conditions:

1. Immediately dismantle — without replacing — its DEI and other social-justice-oriented programs. We don't need those; we need efficient and affordable power.

2. Stop dismantling reliable coal power plants and ramp-back-up the recently shuttered-for-no-good-reason Rush Island power plant. Coal and natural gas are a critical part of American energy. We don't need our power company to be "aligned... with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals." We want it to be aligned with America's — and Midwesterners' — needs! It's one or the other.

3. Stop gaslighting Missourians about how great solar and wind are, and issue a press release — with data — admitting that the efforts to move Missouri to solar and wind have resulted in underwhelming power generation at a high cost, piles of dead protected birds of prey, and an overall destabilizing and weakening of the larger Midwest power generation picture.

4. Present a new plan that moves Missouri into a stronger position with fossil-fuel and nuclear power generation, with a diminishing reliance on unreliable/nondispatchable sources like wind and solar, by 2030. That plan should include the ramping-up of new coal and/or natural gas plants (or the restoration of plants that were recently dismantled) as well as a proposal on the construction of additional nuclear plants. The recent plan that includes the modest addition of more natural gas and nuclear is a nice gesture, but it's still far too littered with wind, solar, and batteries.

An aggressive, value-seeking approach like this would deserve a pay raise.

Otherwise, should Ameren choose to continue down the current path of dismantling our reliable energy grid while pouring resources into destructive DEI and ESG programs, the Missouri PSC ought to expedite the company’s self-assured demise by declining its rate-increase request.

If Ameren wants to be a power company, it ought to be that. But if the company and its shareholders are more interested in charging at windmills than in producing cheap, reliable, American-sourced energy, Missourians at least ought not to be forced to subsidize it.