A group of financiers pursuing potential tax credits is lobbying for the use of private financing to help finish incomplete Tennessee Valley Authority reactors.Facing a limit on the amount of debt it can issue, the federal utility was pursuing a leaseback arrangement for unit 2 at Watts Bar, while a similar project at Bellefonte has been put on hold. A group that includes former TVA Chairman Dennis Bottorff, former TVA Chief Operating Officer Bill McCollum and Credit Suisse wants TVA to complete the reactors using $10 billion in private funding, along with $8 billion in savings it estimates could be achieved by closing all but two of its coal plants. The Chattanooga Times Free Press reported that completing Bellefonte by 2021 would potentially qualify private investors for $2 billion in production tax credits not available to TVA.TVA CEO Bill Johnson, though, said the plan did not match the utility’s financial projections, adding that significantly reduced power demand put the Bellefonte project’s necessity in question. TVA Chairman Bill Sansom said the board had concluded similar proposals in the past did not pencil out.A release from Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander described the meeting as a roundtable discussion. He did not offer outright support for the proposal but said it was worth discussing in the context of reducing power rates. To that end, the financiers said their plan could help cut industrial electric rates by 30 percent. Alexander was joined by fellow Tennessee Republicans Sen. Bob Corker and Rep. John Duncan.
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