[BETA] Fortnightly

Two more states at opposite ends of the country have acted substantively on electric utility restructuring (em one moving full speed ahead toward unbundling of wholesale "merchant" services, the other seeking to slow down the transition to retail wheeling.

The Nevada Public Service Commission (PSC) has released draft sections of a report on electric industry restructuring that was scheduled to go to the state legislature in June. The PSC asked for comments on the completed sections of the report covering engineering and system reliability issues as well as economic and accounting issues related to unbundling of utility rates and services.

The PSC also directed the parties to the case to develop an unbundled tariff for "merchant function" services, defined as:

.Pp

"The procurement of power (generation), power delivery (transmission and distribution), control area services (e.g., scheduling, dispatching, load following, etc.), billing and collection services, and the resale of those services to individuals or groups of end-use electricity consumers."

According to the PSC, the types of costs relevant to providing merchant function services include: 1) marketing and sales expenses; 2) costs associated with power procurement functions (but not actual generation costs); 3) costs for procuring transmission and distribution (T&D) for power delivery (but not actual T&D costs); 4) costs associated with billing and collection services, including metering, billing, customer accounts expenses, uncollectibles, and the like. Re Investigation into Electric Restructuring, Docket No. 95-9022, Apr. 30, 1996 (Nev.P.S.C.).

The North Carolina Utilities Commission (NCUC) has suspended its ongoing investigation of restructuring and the appropriateness of retail competition in electric generation to allow parties to the case to "concentrate their efforts on examining the impact" of Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Orders 888 and 889. The NCUC opened a new proceeding to receive comments on the new FERC orders and extended indefinitely the filing deadlines for comments in its original investigation. Re Investigation of Retail Electric Generation Competition in North Carolina, Docket No. E-100, Sub 77, May 7, 1996 (N.C.U.C.); Re Investigation of Emerging Issues in Electric Industry Restructuring, Docket No. E-100, Sub 78, May 15, 1996 (N.C.U.C.).

Articles found on this page are available to Internet subscribers only. For more information about obtaining a username and password, please call our Customer Service Department at 1-800-368-5001.