After a year of telling investment wonks that it was planning to sell another one of its unprofitable coal-fired power plants to one of its regulated affiliates, while telling everyone else it didn't need any new generation capacity, FirstEnergy gifted itself with a big ol' sack of serendipity last Friday.
FirstEnergy's Mon Power subsidiary issued a Request for Proposals to acquire 1,300 MW of generation capacity, and 100 MW of demand respone.
Serendipity! The Pleasants power station that FirstEnergy's competitive generation affiliate wants to "sell" to Mon Power is exactly 1,300 MW! It's like some divine power has spoken!
I'm not sure whose gift that 100 MW of demand response is supposed to be, but maybe it was designed to placate someone? Demand response is an aggregated group of power customers who agree to cut their usage during periods of high demand in exchange for payments. So, why not 1,300 MW of demand response and 100 MW of generation? Why not 100 MW of demand response and a 1,300 MW power purchase agreement from an economical regional generation source? Why must we buy the cow, when the milk is available cheaply at the market?
Anyhow, Mon Power also limited its RFP to resources in a small geographic area. Serendipity! Pleasants is located in that geographic area!
And after talking about this "sale" and the issuance of an RFP for months, Mon Power issues its RFP on December 16 and allows one week for eligible resources to "pre-qualify" to submit a bid later? Be sure to get your pack of pre-qualifying paperwork in by close of business on December 23, or you won't be able to bid later and there will be no Merry Christmas for you! Bah! Humbug!
Seriously? They expect everyone to believe they didn't issue this RFP so close to the holidays, with a ridiculously short lead time, in order to limit any competition with the company's own resources? I'm sure FirstEnergy's Allegheny Energy Supply Company has its paperwork all ready to be submitted... the rest of you? Yeah, you need to start from scratch. Right now.
So, why should you care? Because the last coal-fired power station that FirstEnergy "sold" to Mon Power has cost you more than $130 so far. Each. You've gifted FirstEnergy more than $160M, but they still want more.
FirstEnergy is in big financial trouble, and they want you to bail them out of their bad business decisions.
And they arrogantly thumb their nose at customers, competitors, and regulators alike with their serendipitous RFP. They must think this is a funny game, but uncompetitive RFPs can get companies in lots and lots of trouble.
What can you do in the mean time? Why don't you ask Mon Power a question, such as why their RFP is so ridiculously unfair? Or ask if Scrooge helped them with their response dates?
FirstEnergy doesn't even care how bad they look. I guess they think they have this in the bag. Stay tuned, pitckfork wielders...
FirstEnergy's Mon Power subsidiary issued a Request for Proposals to acquire 1,300 MW of generation capacity, and 100 MW of demand respone.
Serendipity! The Pleasants power station that FirstEnergy's competitive generation affiliate wants to "sell" to Mon Power is exactly 1,300 MW! It's like some divine power has spoken!
I'm not sure whose gift that 100 MW of demand response is supposed to be, but maybe it was designed to placate someone? Demand response is an aggregated group of power customers who agree to cut their usage during periods of high demand in exchange for payments. So, why not 1,300 MW of demand response and 100 MW of generation? Why not 100 MW of demand response and a 1,300 MW power purchase agreement from an economical regional generation source? Why must we buy the cow, when the milk is available cheaply at the market?
Anyhow, Mon Power also limited its RFP to resources in a small geographic area. Serendipity! Pleasants is located in that geographic area!
And after talking about this "sale" and the issuance of an RFP for months, Mon Power issues its RFP on December 16 and allows one week for eligible resources to "pre-qualify" to submit a bid later? Be sure to get your pack of pre-qualifying paperwork in by close of business on December 23, or you won't be able to bid later and there will be no Merry Christmas for you! Bah! Humbug!
Seriously? They expect everyone to believe they didn't issue this RFP so close to the holidays, with a ridiculously short lead time, in order to limit any competition with the company's own resources? I'm sure FirstEnergy's Allegheny Energy Supply Company has its paperwork all ready to be submitted... the rest of you? Yeah, you need to start from scratch. Right now.
So, why should you care? Because the last coal-fired power station that FirstEnergy "sold" to Mon Power has cost you more than $130 so far. Each. You've gifted FirstEnergy more than $160M, but they still want more.
FirstEnergy is in big financial trouble, and they want you to bail them out of their bad business decisions.
And they arrogantly thumb their nose at customers, competitors, and regulators alike with their serendipitous RFP. They must think this is a funny game, but uncompetitive RFPs can get companies in lots and lots of trouble.
What can you do in the mean time? Why don't you ask Mon Power a question, such as why their RFP is so ridiculously unfair? Or ask if Scrooge helped them with their response dates?
FirstEnergy doesn't even care how bad they look. I guess they think they have this in the bag. Stay tuned, pitckfork wielders...
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