Tackle

As he prepares to take the reins of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) last week said that he does not believe that writing price caps into law should be the first response of Congress to out-of-control wholesale electricity prices seen in California in recent months. Instead, the New Mexico senator argued that Congress should be calling on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to fulfill its responsibilities to ensure just and reasonable wholesale power rates.

Calling natural gas “a key part of the equation,” the Californialegislature’s Assembly speaker formed a special subcommittee onMonday to examine natural gas issues as part of the lawmakers’special session on energy, which so far has concentrated on thestate’s stubborn electricity crisis. The focus will be on cost andavailability as has been the similar electricity subcommittee’scharge.

Western legislators will be leading off one offensive of the newadministration’s energy strategy March 7, with a U.S. HouseResources Committee hearing on restrictions on exploration and gasdevelopment on public lands and the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS)and their impact on power markets.

Western legislators will be leading off one offensive of the newadministration’s energy strategy March 7, with a U.S. HouseResources Committee hearing that explores restrictions on gasdevelopment on public lands and the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS)and their impact on power markets.

Any Department of Energy (DOE) initiative seeking to imposemandatory reliability standards in the electric industry would alsohave to tackle the issue of competition to be effective, theFederal Trade Commission (FTC) says.

Any Department of Energy (DOE) initiative seeking to imposemandatory reliability standards in the electric industry would alsohave to tackle the issue of competition to be effective, theFederal Trade Commission (FTC) says.

Auctions, interconnections, negotiated services and e-commerceare some of the top Order 637-related issues that FERC plans totackle, says a top Commission official.

Instead of trying to tackle head-on all the issues before it inits review of the short-term and long-term transportation markets,Commissioner Linda Breathitt has proposed that FERC first issue alimited final rule addressing the less-controversial issues andsave the more complex items for later. “From what I’ve read in thecomments [filed at FERC], the approach I am proposing appears to beone that many in the market could support,” she said in a recentspeech to the American Gas Association Legal Forum in La Jolla, CA.

FERC is scheduled to tackle two major cases today – “alternativemethods” for regulating pipeline facilities on the OuterContinental Shelf (OCS) and Granite State Gas Transmission’sapplication to build an LNG facility in the town of Wells, ME. Italso is expected to vote on the merger of Enova and PacificEnterprises.