Abstract

The Last Energy War

The restructuring of the $212 billion-a-year electric power industry in the U.S. is proceeding apace, state by state, virtually unremarked upon but promising unparalleled economic and ecological impact. To be sure, the 105th U.S. Congress will see the introduction of several bills to help determine the course that deregulation will take. Grassroots groups are fighting back with referendums and lawsuits of their own, some of them probably headed to the U.S. Supreme Court. But in the interim, hand-to-hand combat over electric power is redefining the American energy economy. Deregulation is bitterly opposed by much of organized labor, especially the electrical unions, who brand it a thinly veiled move to de-unionize the utility industry.