PJM and MISO ran from the altar once before. Now there’s talk of a shotgun wedding.
A challenging year brings a change in the rankings.
Positioning to win in the contest for scale.
The industry’s slow-and-steady pace of mergers seems to be picking up speed, as larger and well-positioned players overtake smaller and weaker targets. Realizing the greatest value from consolidation requires companies to assess their strengths and weaknesses and focus on performance improvement—both before and after a deal gets done.
A purposeful approach to setting energy prices.
Changes in regulatory requirements, market structures, and operational technologies have introduced complexities that traditional ratemaking approaches can’t address. Poorly designed rates lead to cross-subsidies, inequitable outcomes, and perverse incentives. An objective-based approach can better communicate costs to customers in a way that better serves operations and policy goals.
Re-starting the Big Build calls for revisiting cost-recovery mechanisms.
As the industry resumes major capital-spending programs, utilities and their stakeholders are rightly concerned about the effects on prices. Traditional regulatory approaches expose utilities to risks and costs, and can bring rate shock when capital spending finally makes its way into customers’ bills. Pre-funding investments can provide a smoother on-ramp to bearing the costs of a 21st-Century utility system — but it also raises questions for utilities to address.
AEE is very pleased to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the WORLD ENERGY ENGINEERING CONGRESS (WEEC) at Atlanta's Georgia World Congress Center. The WEEC is well-recognized as the most important energy event of national and international scope for end users and energy professionals in all areas of the energy field. The WEEC features a large, multi-track conference agenda, a full line-up of seminars on a variety of current topics, and a comprehensive exposition of the market's most promising new technologies.
The efficient frontier is a portfolio analysis concept designed to assess risk vs. return for an investment portfolio.
The efficient frontier is a portfolio analysis concept designed to assess risk vs. return for an investment portfolio. While the financial projections of individual assets are key to the analysis, the end result is critical to successful structuring of the portfolio as a whole. Key to the efficient frontier is that it represents the highest level of a portfolio's return for any given level of risk. It can be applied to physical assets, as well as financial instruments—simultaneously. Figure 1 displays a typical efficient frontier chart.
Energy Trading & Risk Management: Gas price volatility has increased. Relying on antiquated scheduling systems is a recipe for disaster.
Given energy markets’ newfound volatility and the range of exposures that global energy firms must deal with, the reactive, reporting-oriented nature of transaction management practices is in need of serious revision. A new scheduling module can add tremendous strength and value to a company, primarily in the areas of gas logistics and risk management.
Neal E. Schmale, Executive VP and CFO, Sempra Energy