Feds

Former Enron Corp. CFO Andrew Fastow was charged with fraud, money laundering and conspiracy Wednesday in Houston in connection with the company’s collapse last year, and the U.S. government plans to freeze and require the forfeiture of about $37 million of his assets, according to the Department of Justice’s Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson.

In the first criminal indictments in the Enron Corp. case, three former British bankers have been charged in Houston with fraudulently making off with more than $7 million in profits through an Enron third-party entity. The entity is one in which several Enron executives also benefited, including former CFO Andrew Fastow. The indictments are a signal that investigators are beginning to focus on the bankrupt company’s former executives.

Seeking to bolster the expansive, 18-state regional power grid in their states, western governors last week signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with three key federal agencies. Bush administration officials and the state chief executives cemented the agreement during the Western Governors’ Association (WGA) annual meeting in Coeur d’ Arlene, ID.

As Gov. Gray Davis made the rounds in Washington and New Yorkseeking support for California’s plan to buy and run powertransmission lines, Moody’s sounded a warning that the plan couldfalter if consumers balk at the price tag at the same time powershortages hit this summer. “Absence of progress on the state’sproposed solutions to the California power crisis could worsen thepower crisis and begin to seriously threaten the health of theeconomy,” Moody’s said in a report issued after the market closedTuesday.

State-backed financial bailout options for California’s twocash-strapped utilities were being looked at Friday by the statelegislature and treasurer, including public takeover of the stategrid, as Gov. Gray Davis prepared to divulge his plan today priorto making another trip to Washington, D.C., in search of a federalcap on western wholesale electricity prices later this week.

Chevron, Conoco and Murphy Exploration & Production claim the federal government has tied into a “proverbial Gordian Knot” their efforts to develop nine leases in the Destin Dome 56 project, 25 miles offshore Pensacola, FL.

Chevron, Conoco and Murphy Exploration & Production claimthe federal government has tied into a “proverbial Gordian Knot”their efforts to develop nine leases in the Destin Dome 56 project,25 miles offshore Pensacola, FL. The three producers have filed abreach-of-contract lawsuit against the government, saying a”regulatory Catch 22” between the Commerce Department and theEnvironmental Protection Agency has frozen the review process andprevented the project from ever being approved.

Electric restructuring should be left up to the states and besubject to a minimum of federal government involvement, accordingto one survey just completed for the Electric Consumers’ Alliance(ECA). Meanwhile, another survey by RKS Research & Consultantsfinds commercial customers are increasingly demanding of betterservice and lower rates from their electricity suppliers in stateswhere competition already has begun.