Day 7 of the PSC Hearing (11-9-18)

SCANA CEO Jimmy Addison continued as the first witness. In response to a question he said that he has not and doesn’t intend to read the Bechtel Report, the independent assessment of the nuclear project started in 2015 and ending in 2016 at a cost of $1 million to SCE&G.

Mr. Addison said that SCE&G owned the failure of the project. He said that the bonuses SCE&G paid executives during this project could be taken off the table by Dominion agreeing to absorb the costs.

Mr. Addison said that nobody could predict for certain what would happen in the future if the PSC adopted the ORS proposal. He could not say that SCE&G would file for bankruptcy in that situation.

SCE&G then presented two witnesses in a panel, Ellen Lapson and Robert Hevert. Ms. Lapson testified that SCE&G would be crippled if the ORS proposal to role back rates by 20.93% were adopted and that Dominion would not buy SCE&G under the ORS plan.

Ms. Lapson insisted that SCE&G might not have access to the financial markets and when it did the interest rates would be very high. She maintained that the customers would not be served well under the ORS plan.

Mr. Hevert testified that the Return on Equity for SCE&G should be 10.75% under any plan adopted by the PSC. ORS is calling for a 9.1% ROE.

During the questioning, the ORS attorney pointed out that SCE&G under the current 15% temporary rate reduction has been deemed by financial analysts to have enough liquidity and is solvent.

Commissioner Elam pointed out that one financial analyst said that SCE&G could withstand up to an 18% rate reduction and still be a solid company.

Day 8 of the Hearing will start on Monday, November 12.

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