Dive Summary:
- In 2009, Exelon quit the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the nation's largest business lobby, due to the lobby's dissent on climate change legislation, with then-CEO John Rowe asserting the "carbon-based free is over" and "inaction on climate is not an option."
- Since the hiring of Christopher Crane as CEO 13 months ago, Exelon has gone from clean energy ally to enemy; Exelon recently dumped its support for a clean-coal project in Illinois, rejoined the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and opposed tax credits for wind generation, which spurred the American Wind Energy Association to kick it off its board.
- Crane is fighting against the bottom line: due to wind tax credits, spot prices can go negative when demand is low on the wholesale electricity market; therefore, as coal and nuclear plants are still operating, Exelon is forced to pay grid operators to take their energy.
From the article:
"... The company had a change of heart and rejoined the nation’s largest business lobby a few months ago.
It’s just one of the ways Exelon’s political and environmental allegiances have shifted under Chief Executive Officer Christopher Crane as he confronts cheap natural gas and government-subsidized wind power. Both are eroding profit at the Chicago-based utility, the nation’s biggest operator of nuclear reactors. ..."