BY JOHN DORSCHNER
Miami HeraldState regulators Tuesday terminated a Florida Power & Light voluntary green energy program because three-fourths of the money customers were donating went to marketing and administrative costs.
By a unanimous vote, the Public Service Commission ended FPL's Sunshine Energy Program in which 39,000 customers have voluntarily added $9.75 to their monthly electric bill so that FPL could purchase renewable energy.
FPL in turn contracted with a Texas company, Green Mountain Energy, to carry out the program. PSC staff have been trying for months to find out where the money went, but all it could learn was that 24 percent was going to purchase renewable energy.
Commissioner Nathan Skop, who had once worked for an FPL sister company promoting renewables, said about $9 million in customers' money had gone , "into a black hole where there is no transparency. . . . Clearly this is not right.''