Energy Alliance draws scrutiny over barrage of fraudulent emails in South Carolina, Ohio and Wisconsin

South Carolina law enforcement officials have opened an investigation into emails that were sent to state lawmakers in support of a mega-merger between Dominion Energy and utility company SCANA Corp. Many of these emails — all based on the same template — used the names and addresses of people without their knowledge. The industry group that encouraged customers to tell state lawmakers they supported the merger says it had nothing to do with the falsified emails, despite a history of deceptive letter campaigns. The Consumer Energy Alliance (CEA), a group with dozens of energy industry members including Dominion Energy, admitted the form letters in support of Dominion’s proposed acquisition of SCANA came from the group’s website. But David Holt, the president of the group,said that his group was not involved with sending out the fraudulent emails. South Carolina lawmakers received a barrage of form emails last week from constituents urging the legislators not to pass any laws that could kill the merger deal. Some of the people who supposedly sent the emails say they were impersonated. In response to a request from the South Carolina attorney general’s office, the State Law Enforcement Division on Tuesday opened an official investigation into the matter.