Mulls

FirstEnergy Corp. last week said that an interim report issued by a joint U.S.-Canada task force examining the Aug. 14 blackout that swept across large portions of both countries falls “far short” of providing a complete and comprehensive picture of the conditions that contributed to the devastating and historic series of outages. Meanwhile, the Long Island Power Authority (LIPA) said in the wake of the report, it may seek to recover damages from entities responsible for the blackout.

Florida Gas Transmission (FGT), which is jointly owned by El Paso Corp. and Enron Corp., said Wednesday that it placed the second half of its Phase VI expansion facilities into service at the start of the winter heating season on Nov. 1.

London-based International Power, which owns more than 4,000 MW of power assets in the U.S., last week disclosed that it is considering mothballing some of its U.S. operational capacity. If the company follows through with such a move, it would follow similar decisions made by numerous other power companies in recent months.

Florida Gas Transmission (FGT), which is jointly owned by El Paso Corp. and Enron Corp., said Wednesday that it placed the second half of its Phase VI expansion facilities into service at the start of the winter heating season on Nov. 1.

In an effort to shield jurisdictional companies from having their cash funds drained by parent firms facing financial troubles, FERC last Wednesday issued an interim final rule in which it proposes that regulated natural gas and oil pipelines and public utilities who participate in cash-management arrangements with their parents file written agreements at the agency. A second proposal called for additional financial reports from jurisdictional companies.

Reliant Resources is mulling whether to mothball certain power plants in its U.S. fleet that are losing money, and a top official with the company said that announcements related to such a move are likely to occur in the near future.

In an effort to shield jurisdictional companies from having their cash funds drained by parent firms facing financial troubles, FERC on Wednesday issued an interim final rule in which it is seeking comments on whether regulated natural gas and oil pipelines and public utilities who participate in cash-management arrangement with their parents should file written agreements at the agency. A second proposal called for additional financial reports from jurisdictional companies.

Holding an informal dialogue among its members at its 2003 Summer Committee Meetings in Denver, CO, the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) explored how regulated cost recovery can be used to encourage adequate investment in critical infrastructure.

Rep. Richard Pombo (R-CA), co-chair of the emergency task force on natural gas issues with Rep. Billy Tauzin (R-LA), last week asked the Government Accounting Office to conduct an inventory and report on all administration appeals and judicial litigation that are delaying critical energy exploration and production projects in the United States.