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Fortnightly Magazine - April 15 1997

Ohio Approves Centerior Rate Plan

The Ohio Public Utilities Commission has approved a rate plan for Toledo Edison Co. and Cleveland Electric Illuminating, under which the two electric utilities will freeze both base rates and fuel charges and agree to reduce their present investment in generating station and related assets.

The plan will take effect only if Centerior Energy Corp., the holding company for both utilities, is successful in its proposed merger with Ohio Edison Co. (The approved plan is similar in many ways to one the commission had authorized for Ohio Edison in 1995 (em see Case No.

Byline: 
Phillip S. Cross
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Joules

Stone & Webster will lead a consortia building a $109 million geothermal power plant for Amoseas Indonesia, Inc. The project calls for a second and third unit at the Darajat geothermal station, which taps into geothermal fields in the Garut Regency of West Java, Indonesia. Each unit has a capacity of 70 MW. The entire project was set to be finished by early 2000. Stone & Webster's portion of the contract is worth about $40 million.

Westinghouse Electric Corp. contracted to supply a barge-mounted power plant for the Port of Mombassa Power Barge Project in Malaysia.

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Maine Requires Separate Subsidiary for Noncore Services

Responding to numerous complaints concerning Bangor Hydro-Electric Co.'s entry into the security alarm market, the Maine Public Utilities Commission has set up guidelines for the utility's management of noncore services.

The commission ordered Bangor to: establish a separate subsidiary for its "noncore" utility activities; account for the activities "below-the-line"; and limit its use of certain customer information in providing the ancillary services.

Byline: 
Phillip S. Cross
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New York Adopts Rules for ESCOs

The New York Public Service Commission has adopted eligibility criteria rules for competitive retail energy services companies (ESCOs) seeking to sell electricity in the state.

The state created the March 5 ESCO rules as part of New York's "Competitive Opportunities" proceeding. The rules are consistent with the PSC's May 16, 1996 decision to open markets to wholesale competition in 1997 and to retail competition in 1998. Consumer protections used in the present monopoly environment will be retained during the transition to competition.

Byline: 
Lori A. Burkhart
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Pa. Utilities File Pilot Plans

Investor-owned utilities in Pennsylvania have filed their retail electric competition plans with the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission to comply with recent legislation requiring customer-choice pilots for 5 percent of the peak load of the state's electric utilities.

PECO Energy Co. has filed a proposed electric choice retail pilot program that would allow about 90,000 residential, commercial and industrial customers to choose their electric suppliers as soon as October and no later than January 1998.

Byline: 
Lori A. Burkhart
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Tennessee Reviews Gas Promotion Costs

While authorizing Nashville Gas Co. to increase rates by $4.417 million, the Tennessee Regulatory Authority has modified its existing policy on the treatment of advertising expenses in gas rate cases.

The authority abandoned a past policy limiting advertising recovery to 0.5 percent of the company's gross revenues. It also ordered a 50-50 sharing between ratepayers and shareholders. It granted, however, the LDC's request for full recovery of both payroll and nonpayroll "sales promotion" costs, rejecting allegations the costs should be treated as advertising expenses.

Byline: 
Phillip S. Cross
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Utilities File Suit Against Arizona

Arizona Public Service Co. has filed a lawsuit in the Superior Court of Maricopa County to challenge rules adopted by the Arizona Corporation Commission in December 1996 to open the state's electric industry to competition over a four-year period starting in 1999.

Byline: 
Lori A. Burkhart
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Off Peak

Everybody's got an opinion on electric competition, and they're dying to be asked.

Last year the Colorado Public Utilities Commission opened Docket No. 96Q-313E, In the Matter of the Inquiry Into Electric Utility Industry Restructuring. Then, after weighing several options, and rather than preempt the policy discussion, the PUC mailed a 26-page questionnaire to 360 people identified as "having an interest" in electric utility issues, including investor-owned electric utilities, rural electric cooperatives, municipal utilities and others.

What it learned could fill a book ....

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N.J. Utility Raises Emissions Disclosure Issues

Public Service Electric & Gas Co. has asked the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities to impose mandatory environmental disclosure requirements on all power providers who wish to compete in the state's market.

Specifically, the utility wants an environmental consumer protection standard requiring all sellers planning to compete in New Jersey periodically to disclose their system-wide emission rates or that of the source from which power is produced.

Byline: 
Lori A. Burkhart
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