FCC Rejects NASUCA's 'Repetitious' Reconsideration Request on Backup Power
The FCC dismissed as “repetitious” a petition for reconsideration (PFR) by consumer advocates to revisit the commission’s August 2015 backup power order in docket 14-174. The National Association of State Utility Consumer Advocates (NASUCA) and other consumer groups asked the…
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FCC in November to revisit the tech transition backup power order by putting more of the onus and cost on fixed-service providers and less on consumers (see 1511170042). “We dismiss the NASUCA PFR because it repeats issues that commenters, including NASUCA et al., raised earlier in the proceeding, and that we fully considered and rejected in the Report and Order,” the FCC said in a Wednesday order. Even so, the FCC also rejected the merits of the petition “as an independent ground for action.” Mandating backup power for all customers -- including those who don’t want or need it -- is expensive and inefficient, outweighing potential benefits of economies of scale, it said. And the FCC disagreed that standardization and uniformity are necessary to provide adequate backup power.