Faced

Faced with severe drought conditions and skyrocketing wholesale electricity market prices, the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) on Monday warned that it may be forced to increase wholesale rates by 250% or more after Oct. 1, unless the region’s retail utilities and large industrial customers step up to the plate and agree to slash energy use within the next 60 days.

Faced with severe drought conditions and skyrocketing wholesale electricity market prices, the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) last week warned that it may be forced to increase wholesale rates by 250% or more after Oct. 1, unless the region’s retail utilities and large industrial customers step up to the plate and agree to slash energy use within the next 60 days.

As the state faced the threat of a third day of rollingblack-outs Friday, the California government enacted legislationproviding $400 million to the state water resources agency so itcan substitute for the two failing utilities, Pacific Gas &Electric and Southern California Edison, in buying bulk power forconsumers in northern California.

The legislative architect of California’s 1996 precedent-settingelectric industry restructuring law Monday proposed a $2 billionreserve be carved out of the state’s next fiscal budget to fund astate effort to buy or build new generation plants. Theannouncement came at the same time the state energy commission,which approves all new power plants of 50 MW or larger, released alegislatively mandated report that concludes the state’s generationresources are adequate, and temporary peaking plants are not neededfor the upcoming summer.

As the western states generally, and California in particular,faced another blast of power-draining summer heat, Duke EnergyNorth America (DENA) last week proposed to California Gov. GrayDavis a combination of long- and short-term new generation and afive-year, fixed-price electricity option to buffer mass consumersfrom electric price volatility.

As the western states generally, and California in particular,faced another blast of power-draining summer heat, Duke EnergyNorth America (DENA) proposed Monday to California Gov. Gray Davisa combination of long- and short-term new generation and afive-year, fixed-price electricity option to buffer mass consumersfrom electric price volatility.

Faced with the possibility of loosing its electric marketinglicense in New Jersey because of seedy marketing maneuvers,Sempra’s Energy America cut a deal with the state’s Board of PublicUtilities last week, agreeing to halt its marketing efforts for athree-week span, retrain its agents and stop all “unconscionablemarketing tactics.”

Faced with the possibility of loosing its electric marketinglicense in New Jersey because of seedy marketing maneuvers,Sempra’s Energy America cut a deal with the state’s Board of PublicUtilities last week, agreeing to halt its marketing efforts for athree-week span, retrain its agents and stop all “unconscionablemarketing tactics.”

Faced with an onslaught of new pipeline projects, FERC this weekis expected to propose a policy statement that seeks to establish a”framework” by which it can pick the winner when two or moreprojects are destined for the same market [PL99-3]. The Commissionhas listed discussion of a policy statement on pipelineconstruction certificates on the docket for its regular openmeeting Wednesday. It will be FERC’s last meeting until September.