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Fortnightly Magazine - June 1 1996

Texas-New Mexico Power Proposes Choice

Texas-New Mexico Power Co. (TNMP) has asked the Texas Public Utility Commission to approve "Community Choice," which would allow state customers to choose their energy providers beginning in January 1997. After a five-year transition period, customers would be permitted to choose both their electric and energy services providers. During the transition, TNMP would be allowed to reduce the stranded costs of its only generating plant, TNMP One, by keeping rates, including fuel and purchased-power costs, at current levels.

Byline: 
Lori A. Burkhart
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LDC to Aggregate for Marketers

The Ohio Public Utilities Commission (PUC) has authorized Columbia Gas of Ohio, Inc. to offer aggregation services free of charge to marketers, brokers, producers, or customer groups responsible for delivery of gas supplies to its city gates on behalf of end-users. (But Columbia will seek approval of a service charge in its next rate case.)

The PUC says the new service allows aggregation of customers by agents for scheduling and nominating gas, banking and balancing, and other distribution functions. Re Columbia Gas of Ohio, Inc., Case No. 96-159-GA-ATA, Mar.

Byline: 
Phillip S. Cross
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After Stranding Recovery, What?

Intense though it has been, the debate over stranded electric investment has addressed only half of the issue. What the utilities will do with the money is as important as whether they should recover anything at all.

Retail competition will accelerate the decline of utility-owned generation; utilities will rely less on their own production and more on purchased power to serve their remaining customers.

Byline: 
Robert J. Michaels
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Tennessee to Protect Small LECs

Tennessee law permitting new competition in the local-exchange telephone market clearly protects the state's small incumbent local carriers (LECs with fewer than 100,000 access lines) from market entry by competitive carriers, according to the state public service commission (PSC), unless the incumbent voluntarily elects competition either by executing an interconnection agreement with a local competitor, or by applying for a certificate to provide service outside its franchised service area.

Separate certificate hearings for new market entrants would be inefficient and w

Byline: 
Phillip S. Cross
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The Feds Can Lead...By Getting Out of the Way

Stranded investment is mostly intrastate.

Let the states work free of uncertainty.

Recent activity in both chambers of the U. S. Congress shows federal lawmakers seeking to help the electric industry move toward competition. More than likely, election-year politics will stand in the way. Even so, Congress can go one better: It can step aside and let the states lead the way.

The greatest concern lies in stranded costs (em utility assets and obligations valued on company books at above-market levels.

Byline: 
Steven M. Fetter
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Off Peak

April 23, 1996

On behalf of our members, we want to express our continuing appreciation for the leadership you and your colleagues are showing in seeking enactment of S. 1317, a bill to repeal the Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935, while assuring appropriate consumer and investor protection. As you know, the '35 Act imposes duplicative, unnecessary, and burdensome requirements that are outdated and do not reflect current circumstances in the gas and electric utility industry.

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Rate Unbundling: Are We There Yet? A Reality Check

In an article entitled "Rate Unbundling: Are We There Yet?" (PUBLIC UTILITIES FORTNIGHTLY, Feb. 15, 1996, p. 30), authors Susan Stratton Morse, Meg Meal, and Melissa Lavinson urge regulators to unbundle the cost of capital to recognize that the business risk of electric generation exceeds that of transmission and distribution (T&D).
Byline: 
Joseph F. Brennan and J. Robert Malko
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El Paso Files Capacity Turnback Settlement

El Paso Natural Gas Co. (EPNG) has filed a settlement at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) that resolves its general rate case with natural gas pipeline customers such as Southern California Gas Co. (SCG) as well as the question of who pays for unsubscribed capacity.

Months of confidential negotiations resulted in agreements with 95 percent of EPNG's customers, and with the California, Nevada, and Arizona commissions.

Byline: 
Lori A. Burkhart
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Corporate Unbundling: Are We Ready Yet? A Bondholder's Primer

So the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) won't break up the electric utility industry. But it may happen anyway (em if not at the FERC's direction, then perhaps under pressure from state regulators who, some say, are threatening to link stranded-cost recovery to vertical disaggregation.

What would a breakup mean for bonds and bondholders?

As we reported last month ("New Corporate Structures Place Bondholders at Risk," May 1, 1996, p.

Byline: 
Bruce W. Radford
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