The chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, several FERC commissioners and numerous state public utility commissioners, along with electric power and natural gas company representatives will be offering their views on “Redesigning Wholesale and Retail Energy Markets” at a two-day conference April 29-May 1 in Washington, DC.

The 18th annual conference sponsored by the National Energy Marketers Association (NEM) also will be hearing from representatives of electric power grid operators PJM Interconnection and NYISO.

Retail energy market discussions will focus on recent legislative and regulatory issues in key restructuring jurisdictions, including consumer protection rules, licensing requirements, accelerated customer switching timetables, seamless moves, pricing disclosure requirements and regulatory compliance and enforcement actions.

The conference also will focus on redesigning wholesale energy markets for reliability and price certainty, highlighted by discussion of new energy performance products and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission enforcement actions.

NEM President Craig Goodman said the group also will review the success of measures taken through last winter to avoid the shortages and price spikes of the previous winter.

“Today the industry can better manage unexpected extreme weather, asset and fuel shortages as well as price volatility.”