A chart nearby shows supply, the broken line, bumping into various demand projections in about the amount of time it would take to build new plants. A task force examined energy policy over the past few months and issued an interim report. One of its key recommendations was to allow merchant power plants to operate in Florida. These are plants that are privately owned but not assigned a territory to sell directly to customers. They sell electricity wholesale to distribution systems.
Many states allow merchant power plants.
But when a company tried to build one in Florida, investor owned utilities in the state sensed competition and sued. In another dubious ruling, the Florida Supreme Court found that the awkwardly worded Florida law does not allow them. This law was written nearly 30 years ago to address environmental issues. It was not intended to keep out merchant power plants, which were not even an issue at the time. Florida's law perversely allows only merchant plants below an arbitrary size, which are the most inefficient and costly kind to build.