Berkshire Hathaway CEO Greg Abel is threatening to sell utilities in states that require more electricity to come from renewable sources.
Abel’s comments came Saturday at the annual meeting of the nation’s most valuable conglomerate — its first in 60 years without Warren Buffett as chief executive. They followed Berkshire’s move in February sell off PacifiCorp’s assets in Washington state to Portland General Electric in a $1.9 billion deal.
“When we acquire a utility, we tell the regulators, it’s forever,” said Abel, who ran Berkshire’s energy arm before succeeding Buffett. “But it has to be a relationship that works. And if it’s broken, we’ll find a better path.”
Berkshire’s PacifiCorp is looking to leave Washington after state regulators last year found the utility had not made enough progress toward complying with the Clean Energy Transformation Act, which commits the state having a zero-carbon electricity system by 2045.
