Power Corrupts : Cleaning Up America's Biggest Industry

An investigation into the corruption of the electric industry and its role in polluting our planet.

Electric utilities have faced a few scandals over the past century or so, but corruption is growing as the power industry’s conventional business model is falling apart. Modern technologies challenge their monopoly mindsets and outmoded generators. Threatened utilities, in turn, gun for taxpayer- and ratepayer-funded subsidies, which they increasingly seek through fraud-filled, underhanded schemes. Corruption, however, can be challenged.

In Power Corrupts: Cleaning Up America’s Biggest Industry, Richard Munson reports on blocked bailouts and options for increased transparency and ethics by exploring well-known scandals that have dominated headlines about the energy sector. Munson highlights how power corruption proliferates, enabling outmoded generators to waste money, spew unnecessary pollution, and block clean-energy innovations.Legal cases profiled include Chuck Jones of FirstEnergy, Anne Pramaggiore of Commonwealth Energy, and more.

How did we get here? While reviewing the history of utility regulation, Munson argues misconduct is on the rise because modern technologies threaten power monopolies’ reliance on large nuclear and coal units. As solar and wind costs fall, power monopolies use bribes to survive. Customers and citizens are paying not only for the electricity they use but also the taxes that pay to regulate, subsidize, and investigate utility companies. They should demand more power. Power Corrupts calls for competition and transparency, serving as an essential primer for readers interested in the dark history of the electric industry.