How Southern Company Keeps Solar Competition Out


Georgia has about 12 laws on the books to make it difficult for solar power to compete head to head with fossil power. All twelve were lobbied for successfully by Georgia Power, and its parent Southern Company. But the most effective of the twelve anti-competitive laws is the Territorial Electric Service Act which gives the utility a monopoly over “the purchase of energy”.

The cheapest way to get solar is to just purchase the energy. Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) can deliver clean power at a lower cost than utility power.

Under a PPA, you simply buy the electricity from the the solar panels on your roof – just like you now buy the electricity from your utility now.

Shouldn’t any solar business be able to sell you solar power off your roof? In California, and Colorado and many states they can. I am not sure why the Southern Company is not regulated by the FTC. That rule constitutes imposing  an anti-competitive monopoly in forbidding “the purchase of energy” – except from them.
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