Frontlines
The United States must turn overseas for natural gas supplies, in spite of worries about energy independence.
Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
Predicting California Deman Response
How do customers react to hourly prices?
How do customers react to hourly prices?
As California embarks on a Statewide Pricing Pilot (SPP) for residential and small commercial (200 kW) customers, policymakers and participants in the proceedings are asking several questions:
Frontlines
The United States must turn overseas for natural gas supplies, in spite of worries about energy independence.
Predicting California Deman Response
How do customers react to hourly prices?
How do customers react to hourly prices?
As California embarks on a Statewide Pricing Pilot (SPP) for residential and small commercial (200 kW) customers, policymakers and participants in the proceedings are asking several questions:
Business & Money
Will dividends become the sole focus for investor valuations of utilities?
Will dividends become the sole focus for investor valuations of utilities?
With last month's favorable Senate vote to repeal the tax on dividends from 2004-2006 and reduce it 50 percent this year, and the high-profile conference committee meetings between the House and the Senate at press time, many are asking if investors are, or should be, beginning to evaluate utility companies solely on the basis of the dividend.
Commission Watch
PJM would dictate grid expansion, even if not needed for reliability, and then push the cost of the upgrades on those who use them the most.
PJM would dictate grid expansion, even if not needed for reliability, and then push the cost of the upgrades on those who use them the most.
Chairman Pat Wood and his Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) may well have given up on attempts to impose a standard market design (SMD) on the electric utility industry, but that doesn't mean the nation's grid system operators won't try the same thing.
Benchmarks
Significant obstacles stand in the way of achieving cost savings that should accrue to market-based emissions trading policies.
Plunging Wind Into the Grid
The California ISO's intermittent resource program addresses a key market barrier to wind power: how to schedule wind energy in forward markets.
Commission Watch
The commission tacks a new name onto a familiar concept.
The commission tacks a new name onto a familiar concept.
By now it is old news that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on April 28 back-pedaled on standard market design (SMD), even renaming it the "wholesale power market platform." But SMD is far from dead, as some had wished. Instead, it is merely toned down, bowing to political furor and regional differences.
New York Throws a Curve
ISO's new ICAP scheme seen as subsidy for the gen sector.
For evidence that electric restructuring has lost its way, look no further than ICAP — the dubious idea that to guarantee reliability and low prices, regulators should create a market not just for trading the finished commodity, but also for buying and selling ownership rights in the future ability to produce.