Ladies & Gentlemen:
Please be sure to read the long interview that appears on page A15 of today's (weekend issue), October 22, Wall Street Journal or which is online at the address shown below.
Two short excerpts from the long article are shown below.
It's very seldom that the CEO of a large utility will state publicly the unvarnished truth about electricity and politics so don't miss this one! He describes the outlook, economics, and politics for the principal sources of electric generation -- and puts electricity from wind in its proper perspective.
Glenn Schleede
(In the interest of full disclosure, John Rowe was my boss for much of the time that I worked for the New England Electric System (NEES). He moved to Exelon (actually its predecessor) from NEES in the mid or late-1990s.)
A Life in Energy and (Therefore) Politics
The CEO of America's third-largest utility on competing in an electricity market built on political fads and lobbyists.
By JOSEPH RAGO
New York
'Prostitution, horse racing, gambling and electricity are irresistible to politicians," says John Rowe, the CEO of the Chicago-based utility Exelon.
He'll give you an example of what he means: In 2009, Exelon began work on an urban solar-power project on a blighted field in Chicago's West Pullman neighborhood, in part at the request of then-White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. "Whatever it is, it's not a scandal," says Mr. Rowe, who explains that his company was promised (and applied for) an Energy Department loan guarantee that it ultimately did not receive....
In a visit to The Wall Street Journal's offices recently, Mr. Rowe was eager to strip the altar of green jobs—and the many other political pieties that distort the energy industry, even a few that he says belong to the Journal editorial page.
"The utility business is a funny business and almost no one in any political authority in either party really believes in orderly markets in electricity," Mr. Rowe says. The Emanuel appeal was merely the latest installment in the "series of political negotiations that never ends" and is the lot of any modern energy company.
'Prostitution, horse racing, gambling and electricity are irresistible to politicians," says John Rowe, the CEO of the Chicago-based utility Exelon.
He'll give you an example of what he means: In 2009, Exelon began work on an urban solar-power project on a blighted field in Chicago's West Pullman neighborhood, in part at the request of then-White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. "Whatever it is, it's not a scandal," says Mr. Rowe, who explains that his company was promised (and applied for) an Energy Department loan guarantee that it ultimately did not receive....
In a visit to The Wall Street Journal's offices recently, Mr. Rowe was eager to strip the altar of green jobs—and the many other political pieties that distort the energy industry, even a few that he says belong to the Journal editorial page.
"The utility business is a funny business and almost no one in any political authority in either party really believes in orderly markets in electricity," Mr. Rowe says. The Emanuel appeal was merely the latest installment in the "series of political negotiations that never ends" and is the lot of any modern energy company.
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