Mobilize To Stop Loan Guarantees Next Week

Next week the House and Senate will try to reconsile their two versions of the Energy Bill, and neither version is very friendly towards truly sustainable energy sources. More importantly, the nuclear industry will have all Lobbyist on Deck to try to push through ONE HUNDRED PERCENT loan quarantees for new reactor builds. It is imperiative that the entire GREEN community be on the phones next week doing everything possible to have the loan quarantees and the $50 Billion nuclear gift GUTTED from any bill sent to the White House.

Already, Constellation Energy is trying to use fear, threats and intimadation to force through the 100 percent loan guarantees, announcing this past week that they will not break ground on a new reactor build next year without said loan quarantees in place...so, stop the loan guarantees, and we stop the new builds in their tracks, slow down the Nuclear Renaissance train.

So, this weekend send emails to every one of your elected officials in Washington DC, and starting Monday lets be prepared to SWAMP the House and Senate switchboards with calls demanding that the $50 billion in loan guarantees be stripped from the Energy Bill.

AP
Industry Pushes Nuclear Loan Guarantees
Wednesday November 28, 1:25 pm ET
By Dan Caterinicchia, AP Business Writer

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/071128/constellation_nuke_loans.html?.v=1

Constellation Energy Executive Says Nuclear Plans Will Be Delayed Without Loan Guarantees

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Constellation Energy Group Inc. will not break ground on a new nuclear plant in Maryland next year unless a federal loan-guarantee program is in place, an executive from the power company said Wednesday.

"If the loan-guarantee program is able to materialize in early 2008 so we are able to secure loan guarantees for construction of a new plant at the end of 2008," the company's board could move forward, said Michael Wallace, president of Constellation Energy Generation Group. "If it doesn't, we won't."

The Energy Department last month said it will guarantee loans for up to 80 percent of the construction cost of new nuclear reactors, but that budget constraints mean the earliest any company proposing a new reactor could benefit is 2009.

Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said then that he would seek "substantial" budget increases for loan guarantees to support seven to eight nuclear plants.

"The trend line is positive and encouraging, but today we're not there," Wallace said at a conference in Washington, referring to the industry's ongoing dialogue with the Energy Department, Congress and the White House. But he said it's not a question of whether it will happen, but when.

Three companies already have submitted complete construction and operating license applications for new reactors to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and Constellation filed a partial application earlier this year for a proposed new reactor in Lusby, Md.