| Although this seems like a good idea, having worked for a while in the power industry, I can tell you that there are some definite down sides. The biggest is that the utilities no longer subsidized the lines, and the company that operated the lines now had to make a separate profit just to service them.
End result - line charges are now a separate line item, as the utility now has to pass on the costs directly, and to yet another outside for-profit company. It also takes longer to service lines, as now you have to go through two layers of management to get anything done.
That wasn't the only "bad thing"(TM) to happen with deregulation, but it certainly didn't help. Ironically, the power grid didn't become more reliable as a result. It was already fairly reliable, and for the most part, the same sorts of things that happened before deregulation (traffic accidents, ice storms, squirrels, etc) still happened afterwards.
So, having the lines owned by a separate entity may or may not be a bad idea, but keep in mind that it isn't a perfect panacea. |
