Violations

Bringing to a close its natural gas pipeline safety violations case against Dominion Peoples on Thursday, the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PUC) announced that it has approved a settlement between the utility and the PUC’s prosecutory staff that fines the company $50,000.

In the wake of a blistering report by the Interior Department Inspector General last week of ethics violations and amid fresh allegations that top agency officials blocked four auditors from recovering millions of dollars in oil and natural gas royalties from producers, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) Thursday called on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee to schedule a hearing to question Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne about the charges and what he is doing to address the ethics problems at the department.

A coalition of 15 states and the city of New York on Wednesday sued the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for what they said were violations of Congressionally enacted mandates to adopt stronger energy saving standards for 22 common appliances that use large amounts of electricity, natural gas and oil.

The Securities and Exchange Commission said Friday that Duke Energy has agreed to settle charges of violations of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 involving internal accounting control deficiencies that allowed three Duke Energy traders to misclassify $56.2 million in trading losses between Jan. 1, 2001 and June 30, 2002 in order to receive larger year-end bonuses. The three were indicted in April 2004 by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas (see Daily GPI, April 22, 2004).

The Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC) has fined Peoples Energy affiliate Peoples Energy Services (Pesco) $40,000 for violating the consumer protection provisions of the state’s Alternative Gas Supplier Law by selling gas customers a “fixed rate” plan with prices that were not fixed and with other inadequately disclosed provisions, such as a clause that allows the company to drop the customer because of high gas supply costs.

The Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC) has fined People Energy affiliate Peoples Energy Services (Pesco) $40,000 for violating the consumer protection provisions of the state’s Alternative Gas Supplier Law by selling gas customers a “fixed rate” plan with prices that were not fixed and with other inadequately disclosed provisions, such as a clause that allows the company to drop the customer because of high gas supply costs.

A FERC Administrative Law Judge Tuesday recommended that Enron Corp. be fined $32.5 million for violating federal laws during the western power crisis in 2000-2001. Judge Carmen Cintron also reiterated in her initial decision that Enron’s wholesale electricity trading license be revoked after reviewing testimony that indicated Enron had violated Section 205(c) of the Federal Power Act (FPA).

Without admitting any wrongdoing, National Fuel Gas Supply Corp. last week entered into a consent agreement with FERC enforcement authorities to settle charges that the interstate pipeline gave preferential treatment to certain select customers, including its natural gas marketing affiliate, from 1999 through mid-2002.

Without admitting any wrongdoing, National Fuel Gas Supply Corp. has entered into a consent agreement with FERC enforcement authorities to settle charges that the interstate pipeline gave preferential treatment to certain select customers, including its natural gas marketing affiliate, from 1999 through mid-2002.