$460 Million Stimulus Comes to Florida This Year, From Shale Revolution, and No Taxpayer Dollars

John Hanger highlights a $460 million stimulus to the Florida economy this year, thanks to lower natural gas prices that prompted Florida's largest utility company to switch from oil to gas for electricity generation:

"Gas has been mainly displacing coal in electricity generation and not much oil for the simple reason that oil provides about 1% of America's electricity and that number is declining.  There is not a lot of oil to displace in the electricity industry, but FPL, Florida's biggest electric utility, is an exception.

Oil accounts for 15% of FPL's generation capacity and 4% of its electric generation, but FPL is aggressively switching its oil generation to gas, as a result of low gas prices, to the considerable benefit of the environment and consumers. FPL still has a monopoly on electricity generation so it collects from its customers every single dollar it spends on fuel to generate electricity.  Low natural gas prices will cut by an incredible $460 million the fuel costs collected from consumers just in 2012."

HT: Robert Kuehl