Permitting

Former coal lobbyist Glenn Schleede plays Don Quixote, crusading against the DOE's 20-year initiative to boost investment in windmills.

California again is the proving ground. Analysts see DG as the biggest issue since the PUC first mapped its "vision" for retail competition.

Make gas pipeline rights more fungible, but draw the line at contingent bidding.

Last July the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission proposed mandatory auctions to allocate all capacity rights shorter than one year's duration on interstate natural gas pipelines. (See RM98-10-000, Regulation of Short-term Natural Gas Transportation Services, FERC, July 29, 1998.) At a technical conference held Oct.

Retail wheeling has been repeatedly condemned by opponents who claim that it would cause rate discrimination between customer classes. They allege that it would unfairly reduce rates for large customers, while raising them for small ones. But discriminatory rate structures already result from the selective discounts that utilities grant their large customers.