Business & Money

The venerated process may get a makeover.

Like dough in the hands of a crazed pizza chef, merchant power generators have been tossed and turned in tumultuous markets over the past two years. Further uncertainties over market restructuring have pushed many merchants to the brink of despair-and beyond.

But on June 10, 2003, a glimmer of hope appeared at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), and it came from an unexpected source: Entergy Services Inc., the holding company for Entergy's regulated utilities.

Entergy's petition proposes to change the way the company sources its week-ahead power supplies so that its own plants would compete fairly against wholesale power merchants.

Entergy's petition barely showed up on the radar screens of industry watchers, but it represents a shot over the bow of the industry's established economic-dispatch processes.

Utilities have been dispatching their supply resources on an economic basis for decades. But they have typically included only their own plants or generation sources under contract. In most cases, economic dispatch processes have not considered merchant plants that might be able to supply power more economically.

If granted by FERC, Entergy's order could serve as a catalyst to reformulate the industry's venerated economic-dispatch protocols. And now might be just the right time for such a catalyst. Re-cent noises on Capitol Hill suggest that legislators and regulators will be receptive to the idea of expanding the definition of economic dispatch.

Creole Controversy

Entergy has been feeling the heat lately, and it has nothing to do with Loui-siana's steamy climate.