I really, really, really hope this:

“AmerenUE CEO Tom Voss said the company is suspending its efforts to build a second nuclear plant in Missouri because of the failure of legislation it was pushing in the General Assembly,”

is true. And by true, I mean that I hope this is a long term decision. So long in fact, that solar and wind energy have supplanted the dirty “nastinest” that currently powers America. Down with nuclear, down with coal!

There’s some chatter that Ameren is just regrouping and will be on the attack again. I trust the good guys will snuff out any efforts before they gain momentum. For those of you who haven’t been following this issue, the main point of contention hasn’t been nuclear power as the source of new energy in Missouri, but how the consumers would be affected by the construction of a new nuclear plant. In summary:

“At a news conference at Ameren’s St. Louis headquarters this morning, Voss said he had asked lawmakers to withdraw from consideration the bill the company had been pushing to repeal the state’s construction work in progress law. If passed, the bill would have allowed the utility to charge consumers for some costs of the proposed $6 billion-plus facility before it were up and running. Critics, including consumer groups and large industrial companies, said the bill would have led to huge price hikes and would have gutted the consumer protections available to the Public Service Commission.”

It’s the construction work in progress law, commonly known as CWIP, that’s the issue. AmerenUE embarked on a pretty expensive public relations campaign to convince the public that they wouldn’t get royally screwed by the company’s endeavor. Fortunately, for once, most of our elected officials weren’t fooled.

What’s next, clean coal?! Ha.