Revisiting California
Market power after two years.
Armed with new data, a well-known economist discusses what really happened.
Economics
The Economists: On the Future of Energy Markets
Uncertainty clouds direction of FERC’s market engineering.
The failure of California markets, Enron, and the low-point of the merchant plant business cycle has left many executives pessimistic over the prospects that true competitive markets in energy will develop. Top economists discuss the industry’s outlook.
The Perils of Greenfield Gas Development
Sempra promised regulators they’d build a new utility, but Nova Scotia is still waiting.
A major gas discovery offshore Nova Scotia-3.5 trillion cf, based on conservative estimates-is generating healthy financial earnings for participating producers and pipelines. But residents and small businesses in Nova Scotia aren't seeing a molecule of gas flowing their way.
Regulators to Blame? How Competitive Metering Has Failed
How Competitive Metering Has Failed
Natural Gas Hedging: A Primer for Utilities and Regulators
What commissions need to learn. <br>What LDCs should already know.
Natural Gas Hedging: A Primer for Utilities and Regulators
What commissions need to learn.
What LDCs should already know.The facts are now in. If utilities had hedged their natural gas purchases during the 1990s, they could have earned windfalls for those they serve, given the wild price gyrations of the past decade (). Yet few if any households or businesses saw any windfall, because few utilities were engaged in futures and other derivatives markets.
Wind Power, Poised for Take Off?
A survey of projects and economics.
An industry advocate touts the recent rise of projects in the pipeline and forsees remarkable growth in wind farms over the next twenty years — more, perhaps, than others would concede.
U.S. Gas Production: Can We Trust the Projections?
Government (EIA) forecasts suffer in credibility when compared with geologic assessments.
The EIA predicts that natural gas consumption will climb more than 60 percent percent over 20 years, driving U.S. production up 50-plus percent over the same period. How does that square with geologic assessments?
Assuring Enough Generation: Whose Job and How to Do It
A California failed to fashion proper incentives. Now others may repeat that mistake.
1 "Load-serving entities" are firms that serve retail electricity customers. These firms include utilities and power marketers.
2 See L.D. Kirsch, "ISO Economics: How California Flubbed It on Transmission Pricing", Public Utilities Fortnightly, Oct. 15, 1998, p. 24.
3 See J.E. Bowring and R.E. Gramlich, "The Role of Capacity Obligations in a Restructured Pennsylvania-New Jersey-Maryland Electricity Market", Electricity Journal, November 2000, pp. 57-67.
Decommissioning Funds: Snagged on Tax Law?
How outdated rules could deny tax deductions to nuclear plant owners.
1 1999 TNT 204-24 PECO Energy's Testimony at Finance Hearing on Tax Issues of Electric Power Industry. (Hereinafter, "PECO Energy Testimony.")
2 Treas. Reg. 1.468A (c)(2). For a more detailed explanation, see Nuclear Energy Institute Policy Briefs, "Why Tax Treatment of Decommissioning Trust Funds Must Be Updated to Reflect New Business Conditions," http://www.nei.org/doc.asp?catnum=3&catid=221.
Dancing With Goliath: Prospects After the Breakup of Ontario Hydro
How market power likely will emerge, despite the government's good intentions.
¥ CUSTOMBid is a product of Mellowmede Ltd., developed in consultation with the staff of London Economics International LLC. London Economics International LLC is an exclusive licensee of CUSTOMBid.
# "Cournot competition" refers to an oligopoly in which each firm believes that its rivals are committed to a certain level of production and that rivals will reduce their prices as needed to sell that amount.