Pennsylvania Power & Light Co. said Thursday (8/31) it would not be appropriate for the company to comment on the specific elements of the state Public Utility Commission's polling on the utility's first base rate increase request in 10 years.

"The polling does not represent a formal action by the commission," said William F. Hecht, PP&L's chairman, president and chief executive officer. "We respect the process and for that reason, we think it would be inappropriate for us to comment on the positions taken by individual commissioners."

Hecht did say that if the commissioners' final order is along the lines of Thursday's polling, PP&L would receive a rate increase of about $100 million, or about 4.5 percent. The company had requested an 11.7 percent, or $261 million, increase when it filed the case with the commission in December.

If the commission acts along the lines of the informal polling, Hecht said, it also would approve a PP&L-proposed $90 million decrease in rates in 1999. This rate reduction is the result of changes in depreciation costs at the Susquehanna plant at that time. "Therefore, a good portion of this proposed increase would be returned to customers beginning in less than three-and-one-half years," he said.

The commission is expected to reach a final decision on the rate increase request at its public meeting on Sept. 27.

Hecht said the company is looking forward to a final decision on the request.

"For the eight months this case has been under consideration, we have said that we filed for a rate increase as a last resort -- only after we had exhausted other possibilities," said Hecht. "As this case comes to a conclusion, we pledge to do our best to avoid filing for another increase as long as possible. The last time we made that pledge, we avoided requesting a base rate increase for a decade," said Hecht.

Hecht also praised PP&L employees for their "continued excellent performance amid all the distractions facing them over the past several weeks.

"This continuing dedication to superior effort translates into this long-term rate stability as well as short-term benefits to customers," said Hecht. He pointed out that the strong performance of the company's generating stations, along with outages at other companies' plants, has enabled PP&L to sell more electricity than budgeted to others in the regional market. Benefits from these sales, he said, are returned to customers through the Energy Cost Rate on their bills.