The Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC) has reaffirmed earlier rulings that the state's least-cost planning laws must require consideration of the adverse external environmental costs of providing utility service. However, it rejected proposed new rules that would require monetization of the externalities based on projected costs of complying with future environmental regulations. The ICC explained that state law did not require either monetization of the values or consideration of "futuristic environmental laws and regulations." It said it could not impose regulations that even "suggest acquiescence in the reliability of tentative governmental regulations as a basis for cost-forecasting in the least-cost plan process." (No. 92-0274, Nov. 22, 1994.) .R2

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