The Maine Public Utilities Commission (PUC) has approved a regulatory reform plan for New England Telephone and Telegraph Co., a telephone local exchange carrier (LEC). The plan includes a price cap program for "core" services (em that is, nondiscretionary services such as basic exchange and toll services. The price-cap structure and pricing rules will not apply to the LEC's noncore services.

In an important case involving electric retail competition, the New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission (PUC) has made a series of legal rulings favoring a proposal by Freedom Electric Power Co. to purchase and resell power to end users currently served by Public Service Co. of New Hampshire (PSNH). The PUC ruled that franchises granted to electric utilities in the state are not exclusive and that the proposed activities would make the energy company a public utility if approved and implemented.

Close Close Percent 52-Wk 52-Wk Div Div Book P/E Last

Company Region 03/31/95 06/30/95 Change High Low Rate Yield Value Ratio 12 Mos.Electric Utilities

AEP Company Inc. Midwest 31.75 35.13 10.63 35.75 29.00 2.40 6.83 22.68 13 2.68

Unicom Corp. Midwest 23.75 26.63 12.11 27.75 20.63 1.60 6.01 24.39 14 1.90

Union Electric Co.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has adopted a final rule for nuclear plant decommissioning trust funds that will allow greater investment flexibility and enable funds to take advantage of changing market conditions (Docket No. RM94-14-000). The rule aims to improve the returns earned on funds contributed through wholesale electric rates, thereby decreasing the amount collected from ratepayers.

For the first time, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has issued opinions disallowing income tax allowances in the cost of service with respect to income from limited partnership interests held by individuals. In Lakehead Pipe Line Co., Ltd. Partnership, the FERC found that allowing a tax allowance for limited partnerships made up of individuals would give the investors an after-tax return on equity higher than they are entitled to (Docket Nos. IS92-27-000, et al.).

New business opportunities, improved internal communications, and energy information services: three solid reasons electric utilities should form a telecommunications strategy (if they haven't already). Yet, while these motivations are compelling, none really demands utility participation.

Efforts to site new facilities for the disposal of hazardous waste (HW) and radioactive waste have met with utter paralysis. HW disposal companies have spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to site new landfills and incinerators for this waste, but most of this money has gone down the drain. Since the enactment of the chief federal law on HW, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976 (RCRA), only one new HW landfill has opened on a new site in the United States (in prophetically named Last Chance, CO).

The New York Power Authority (NYPA) favors restructuring opportunities consistent with a statewide,

single-operator transmission system. Their proposed model, submitted to the New York Public Service Commission (PSC) as part of the "Competitive Opportunities" proceeding, envisions an independent system operator that would own and operate all transmission facilities in the state. Alternatively, NYPA would agree to a consortium in which owners cede their facilities to a single operating entity via a contractual relationship.

By a 2-1 vote, the Texas Public Utilities Commission (PUC) has placed a condition on approval of Houston Lighting and Power's (HLP) experimental tariff for special contract pricing (Rate Schedule SCP) with industrial customers whose electric power needs are or can be served by alternative sources of power: The floor of the rates must be designed to recover marginal costs (Docket No. 12957). The order on rehearing affirmed an earlier PUC decision shortening the term of the contracts from the proposed 7 to 10 years to 5 to 10 years.