New York regulators stop a billion-dollar powerplant--already built--from generating electricity

I want to show you a textbook example of how corrupt officials cripple and ultimately kill what was once a nation of free enterprise doing great things.  Even though no one gets killed or threatened with death or the death of their child, the method is just as effective.

In New York, protests by "environmentalists" (actually socialists, but same result) have pressured state regulators into forcing a large nuclear powerplant to shut down in three years--which would leave the region short of electricity.

Since no one--not even the screaming, wailing, hair-pulling enviros and socialists--is willing to give up their use of electricity (just as they wail about the claimed deadly effect of global warming but still drive gasoline-powered cars), it was left to some adult, somewhere, to provide the demanded product.  The protesters had enough votes to pressure NY governor Andrew Cuomo to pressure state agencies to rule out a new nuclear plant, or coal-fired, but would have been fine with wind or solar.

Unfortunately those sources are AT BEST intermittent.  So unless residents would be okay with blackouts every day or two, that wouldn't do.  The topography wouldn't work for hydro.  And as noted, the greenies wouldn't allow a coal-fired plant.

Gosh, what does that leave?  How about...natural gas--the cleanest fossil fuel.  Much more costly than coal, but virtually non-polluting.

So a company--"Competitive Power Ventures" (CPV)--committed a Billion dollars to build a smallish 630-megawatt gas-fired powerplant.  Like all such ventures, not a single taxpayer dollar would be used to build the thing.  All private enterprise.  Free market in action, to keep supplying consumers with the electricity they demand.  And so far CPV has spent just under a billion dollars on the plant.

Unfortunately the company didn't pay off the politicians.  Not that it was doing anything illegal or unethical, but if you have a huge project in New York or Chicago or L.A. or Miami, you'd better be prepared to pay a few million in bribes or else..."Hey, dat pipe's an inch off the location on dis plat, so I'm gonna haf'ta shut dis project down while you see if youse can get da permit changed."
 
In this case the state agency with the knife to the company's throat is the Department of Environmental Conservation.

The plant was supposed to begin producing electricity last February, but that was delayed.  Was it because of mismanagement?  Shortage of materials?  Terrible rains (no doubt due to global warming)?  No.  It was delayed because the DEC refused to issue key environmental permits for construction of the pipeline that would supply natural gas to the plant.

Just FYI:  The interest on a billion-dollar loan means it costs CPV about $220,000 for each day of delay in producing electricity.

With the pipeline delay, the plant was now slated to start generating electricity on August 5th.  It didn't, because some time earlier the DEC told the company the "air permit" it had wouldn't cover operation, and that it needed a "Title V air permit " from the Environmental Protection Agency before it could renew its state permit.  The company applied for it, and four days before the plant was expected to begin commercial operation. the DEC announced it was refusing to renew the state "air permit."

"See, dis pipe is an inch off, so...."

Last Tuesday CPV sued the state and the DEC.  Neither the agency nor governor Cuomo's office responded to requests for comment Tuesday afternoon.

In its letter announcing its refusal to renew the state permit, the DEC told CPV that doing anything to cause emissions at the plant would break state and federal laws, threatening hefty fines if the plant fires up.

CPV immediately requested a hearing with the DEC on its decision to deny renewing the air permit.
But a hearing could take months or even a year to conclude--with the meter running at $220,000 per day.

Four days before CPV’s previous state air permit was scheduled to expire, company officials met with DEC staff.   The lawsuit claims DEC staff never mentioned that an additional permit was required in order to get the existing state air permit renewed.

Part of the problem may be that in 2016 Cuomo’s counsel, Alphonso David, ordered communication to cease between all state regulatory agencies and CPV, during a federal investigation that led to the conviction of a former top aide to Cuomo for soliciting bribes from a CPV executive.
Short answer: If a company wants to do a billion-dollar project in a big Dem-controlled state, the trick is to spend ten million to bribe top officials.  Is that a good system?  Hell no.  But in New York, Chicago, L.A. and other Dem hell-holes, it's the way you have to operate.

Remind me again:  What's the difference between Democrat rule and a third-world nation?

H/T Times Herald-Record.