The CEO of Minnesota’s second-largest utility and would-be suitors controlled by private equity giant BlackRock told regulators that the proposed $6.2 billion buyout was a pathway needed to help the company meet the state’s climate goals and eliminate electricity-sector carbon emissions.
But consumer and environmental groups urged the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission to block the deal, saying the utility can raise needed funds as it has for decades — through public markets — and warned that private investors can only reap profits needed to justify the deal by raising rates.
The contrasting views of the proposed purchase of Duluth-based Allete, the parent company of Minnesota Power, framed a daylong hearing on the risks and benefits of the deal, which needs the PUC’s blessing to move forward. The five-member commission, all appointees of Gov. Tim Walz (D), is expected to vote on it next week.
The hearing comes 16 months after a partnership led by two of the world’s largest private investors, New York-based Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP) and the Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board, announced it was buying Allete for $67 a share, a 10 percent premium to the utility’s stock price two days earlier.
