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The head of California’s small power producers’ trade group and state political officials clashed in separate news media conference calls Wednesday over whether past and present political considerations are hampering moves to bring stability to the state’s continuously unsettled energy markets.

As the five-week-old hearing into whether El Paso Natural Gas manipulated gas prices in California last year wound down at FERC last Tuesday, a war of words erupted over just how much transportation on the pipeline was unavailable to customers during 2000 for reasons other than operational factors.

As the five-week-old hearing into whether El Paso Natural Gas manipulated gas prices in California last year winds down at FERC, a war of words has erupted over just how much transportation on the pipeline was unavailable to customers during 2000 for reasons other than operational factors.

Dynegy last Friday clarified its squabble with Sempra Energy’s San Diego utility unit, contending that it never asked for 18 smaller power plants to be shut down, regardless of orders from the California Independent System Operator (Cal-ISO) to produce electricity during peak demand hours.

With California caught in the “midst of a profoundlyserious…crisis” in its deregulated energy markets, the CaliforniaPublic Utilities Commission (CPUC) has called on FERC to “actimmediately” on its complaint against El Paso Natural Gas toprovide some price relief for natural gas and electric customers inthe state.

Consumers and utilities continued to butt heads in Californialast week over how to deal with almost $5 billion in uncollectedrevenues by the state’s three major investor-owned utilities in thewake of this summer’s wholesale electricity price spikes. Withretail rates frozen the utilities have only collected a portion ofthe added cost of power since May. Consumer activists in SanFrancisco and San Diego last Tuesday launched a campaign againstthe utilities seeking pledges from political candidates throughoutthe state to promise to oppose the utilities’ attempts to raiseconsumer rates to recover their costs.

Consumers and utilities continued to butt heads in Californialast week over how to deal with almost $5 billion in uncollectedrevenues by the state’s three major investor-owned utilities in thewake of this summer’s wholesale electricity price spikes. Withretail rates frozen the utilities have only collected a portion ofthe added cost of power since May. Consumer activists in SanFrancisco and San Diego last week launched a campaign against theutilities seeking pledges from political candidates throughout thestate to oppose attempts to raise consumer rates to recoverutilities’ costs.

Switching games? Or mind games? This past week, a Washington,D.C.-based nonprofit group, United Homeowners Association, called apress conference to charge that nationwide, utilities are playing”switching games” with consumers who attempt to move to alower-cost competitor, or who attempt to use online energycompanies.

UtiliCorp United and Andersen Consulting are engaged in a legalbattle over fees for work Andersen did for UtiliCorp that theclient says spiraled to more than twice the amount agreed upon.Most recently, UtiliCorp filed a $10 million suit in a Missouricourt charging Andersen with negligence and failure to live up toterms of a 1996 contract for administrative software and systems.The suit is a response to a complaint filed in March by Andersenseeking payment of fees UtiliCorp had withheld.