AmerenUE, the state’s largest electric utility, is abandoning its legislative effort to change Missouri’s Construction Work in Progress (CWIP) law.

The General Assembly has been dealing with the legislation which would change the law to allow Ameren to charge ratepayers for construction of a second nuclear power plant in Callaway County while the facility is still being built. Charging customers before a facility is completed is currently banned under state law. The effort to change the law has run into a lot of opposition in both the House and Senate and faced an uphill climb in the remaining three weeks of the legislative session. Now, Ameren wants the legislation pulled.

A statement from AmerenUE President Thomas Voss says, "We want to thank the visionary leadership in both the Missouri House and Senate, where the legislation won strong initial support in committees in both bodies. Many representatives and senators understood the need for acting now to secure Missouri’s energy independence and security, agreeing with us that allowing these funding mechanisms is best for Missouri."

The Voss statement then points to the problems encountered during the legislative process.

"The current version of the bill being debated in the Senate strips the legislation of the very provisions we needed most to move forward," said Voss. "As a result, AmerenUE is suspending its efforts to build a nuclear power plant in Missouri."

The estimated price of building a second nuclear plant in Mid-Missouri was pegged at about $6-billion.