A Florida House committee signaled its willingness Thursday to make official what has already happened in practice and passed a bill that will end the future development of nuclear power plants in Florida.

The House Energy and Utility Committee approved PCB 13-01 to prevent utility companies from charging customers for the development of nuclear plants before they obtain a license and precludes any new power plants from being eligible to collect the nuclear fees.

“This is only a start but, it should not go unnoticed this is a big start,’’ said Rep. Jose Felix Diaz, R-Miami, chairman of the committee.

Since the nuclear cost recovery statute was passed in 2006, Progress Energy has charged customers more than $1 billion to expand the now shutdown Crystal River nuclear power plant and to start developing a new nuclear power plant in Levy County. The company terminated the Crystal River project, does not have a permit for the Levy County project, but has kept $150 million of the money in profits.

Florida Power & Light collected $511 million and used the money to finance expansions to its existing power plants at Turkey Point and in St. Lucie County. It has also proposed building two new reactors at Turkey Point but has not yet obtained a permit from the federal government to do it.