OCR Text |
Show CASE BEFORE SUPREME COURT If the Supreme Court allows al-lows the district court ruling rul-ing to stand, the further development of cogener-atlon, cogener-atlon, wind, small scale hydro hy-dro and solar power would be seriously impeded. Conservation and efficiency effi-ciency are as much sources . of energy as a newly discovered dis-covered domestic oil field. ! Sections of PURPA, which were declared unconstltu-! unconstltu-! tlonal by the district court encourage utility companies compani-es to set rates that give consumers incentives to use energy more efficiently. A case to be heard before be-fore the U.S. Supreme Court when It convenes this October Octo-ber will have a profound effect on the future of the nation's conservation and alternative energy programs. pro-grams. The case concerns positions of the Public U-tility U-tility Regulatory Policies Act, which a U.S. District Court has declared unconstitutional. uncon-stitutional. Passed by Congress In 1978 as part of former President Carter's national-energy national-energy plan, it was designed design-ed to encourage public utilities utili-ties to practice energy conservation. con-servation. The law requires utilities to buy and sell power pow-er to and from small, individual indi-vidual power producers at fair rates. The State of Mississippi, and the Miss. Power and Light Co. challenged chal-lenged PURPA in a suit, and last February the U.S. ' District Court declared sections sec-tions of It unconstitutional. |