Become a PUF Member Organization

American Wind Energy Association

Tariff Tinkering

FERC says it won’t ‘change’ the native-load preference, but don’t bet on it.

When FERC opened wholesale power markets to competition a decade ago in Order No. 888, it codified a system for awarding grid access known as the pro forma Open-Access Transmission Tariff (OATT), founded on physical rights, and on the fiction that electrons travel along a “contract path.” Should the commission “tinker” with the OATT, making only surgical changes to make it current? Or, do events instead warrant a complete overhaul?

Byline: 

Bruce W. Radford

Read Entire Article

Windpower: Beyond Boom and Bust

Windpower is caught in a vicious cycle of Washington politics. Escaping the cycle will require visionary leadership in Congress and the utility industry.

With the Production Tax Credit subject to the whims of a fickle Congress, U.S. windpower remains in an ongoing state of uncertainty. Will the United States embrace the technology?
Byline: 

Michael T. Burr

Read Entire Article

Roundtable: The Future Of Generation

Meeting tomorrow’s power needs will pose tough choices.

A group of executives and analysts tell Fortnightly that the outlook for generation is positive, because it has to be. But making generation work well—affordably, cleanly, and reliably—won’t be easy.
Byline: 

Michael T. Burr

Read Entire Article

Renewable Energy: Growing Pains, Halting Gains

Technology Corridor: Mandatory portfolio standards have different implications for different technologies.

The federal government and several state governments are considering programs to increase the share of electricity produced by renewable generation resources to 20 percent or more. If these programs are implemented and pursued successfully, they will trigger a dramatic change in the role of renewable generation and the requirements placed upon it by the market.
Byline: 

Edward A. Reid Jr.

Read Entire Article

Close to Load, Far From Consensus

Feds seek plug-and-play for distributed generation, but utilities want the power to stay local.

Pity the poor Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. With its market crusade out of favor, and transmission reform suddenly suspect after the Aug. 14 blackout, it could use a new agenda. Indeed, FERC this past July had proposed a new set of standards for the connection of small- and micro-sized power plants units to regional transmission networks, or even to radial or local distribution lines operating at low voltages.
Byline: 

Bruce W. Radford

Read Entire Article

Wind Power, Poised for Take Off?

A survey of projects and economics.

An industry advocate touts the recent rise of projects in the pipeline and forsees remarkable growth in wind farms over the next twenty years — more, perhaps, than others would concede.
Byline: 

Christine Real de Azua

Read Entire Article

News Digest

PUC Oversight: Panacea or New Problem?

News Digest


 

Byline: 
Docket No. ER97-2353-000, Opinion No. 447, 92 FERC ¶61,169, Aug. 17, 2000
Read Entire Article

News Analysis

A Twenty-Fold Increase?

Former coal lobbyist Glenn Schleede plays Don Quixote, crusading against the DOE's 20-year initiative to boost investment in windmills.

Byline: 

Bruce W. Radford

Read Entire Article