Merrill Lynch Endorsement

One of the prerequisites for new nuclear power plants to become a reality in the U.S. is the backing of Wall Street. Antinuclear groups like to say that nuclear power isn't economical, but in the past year evidence of support from the financial community has been accumulating. Most recently, in its report "Cleaning the Environment" issued last month, Merrill Lynch said:

Utilities with sizable holdings of emission-free nuclear power plants are well-positioned for gains through the end of the decade as a result of more stringent air quality regulations that will affect other forms of electricity generation.

More of what the company said about nuclear is here.

Time to check my investment portfolio...

Comments

Anonymous said…

Old plant/new plant problem again Lisa. Why don't you call Merrill and ask them what they think of utilities financing a new plant build?

I'm sure you'll get a rather different investor perspective than the one they gave for utilities milking the low operating costs at existing plants that have already written off massive capital costs either through past bankruptcies or stranded costs; or recovered most of them prior to deregulation.

January 15, 2006 at 12:06 AM

Anonymous said…

Does anyone know where I can get a copy of this report?

January 17, 2006 at 3:43 AM

Anonymous said…

With more than 10 bloggers on this site, you'd think that one of you could actually monitor the comments thread and provide poster #2 with info on the report you just cited. Eric - isn't this blog a big part of your job? How about some follow-up?

January 23, 2006 at 1:52 PM

Eric McErlain said…

In general, monitoring individual threads is up to the person who writes the original post. However, please note that everyone who writes for NEI Nuclear Notes is a volunteer, and is employed full time at NEI or one of its member companies.

That being said, the report in question is available for $4.95 U.S. from Platts.

January 23, 2006 at 2:53 PM

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