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[quote]QUOTE: Originally posted by futuremodal Geez, so many off the wall retorts, so little time..... Mark in utah - was that plant built pre-Staggers or post-Staggers? Makes a huge difference, since most rail dependent plants were built back when rates were still regulated, thus the investors believed they would retain relatively low shipping costs. [/quote] The IPP plant was completed in the early 80's, which means that the planning and construction was done in the '70's. Not being that heavily involved in the RR business, I'm guessing that the freight rates were regulated and reasonable at the time. Utah coal costs were quite reasonable, and still are to a degree even though they've gone up almost 50% over the last few years as eastern utilities gobble up all the clean coal they can. As for the "problems" associated with open access, these can be solved by adding more capacity. Right now utilities are scared to add more capacity because of the uncertaintities around de-regulation. They're waiting for the other shoe to fall. The problem is that NOBODY has talked about deregulating the entire electrical supply system, only the generation plants. The transmission and distribution system would continue to be heaviliy regulated. This is closely akin to regulating the rates charged for trains to use the tracks, but deregulating the train owners to charge what they wish. UP would be free to charge what they wish for hauling coal, but Utah Railway or BNSF could step in and run coal trains to IPP and pay the same trackage rates that UP has to charge itself, plus a reasonable margin for profit (regulated rate of return). Mark in Utah
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