Perspective
Emotions have run high in the SMD/RTO debate. It's time for cooler heads to prevail.
Perspective
Feel-Good Electric Waste
Like diets that make us fat, efficiency is bad for the environment.
The last 30 years in America have seen great improvements in the energy efficiency of electric motors, appliances, and other end-use equipment. Think of compact fluorescents, ground-source heat pumps, and thermal window glazing. Add variable speed drives, chilled water AC, and high-pressure sodium street lighting. You name it, we've got it.
Perspective
Ontario's government has imposed substantial burdens on customers, with no benefits.
On the Brink: Avoiding a Canadian California
Ontario's government has imposed substantial burdens on customers, with no benefits.
On a recent trip through Toronto's Pearson International Airport, I was stopped by an immigration official who, upon learning my business, snapped, "Why would anyone hire a Yank to advise on the Ontario electricity sector?"
Perspective
An analyst looks at prospects for emerging power technologies in light of the recent turmoil over deregulation.
Goodbye to All That?
Perspective
Solving the industry's problems will require cooperation between the federal government and states.
We Can Work It Out
Solving the industry's problems will require cooperation between the federal government and states.
If we are to successfully forge a new, efficient and customer-focused structure for the electric industry, state and federal regulators must work together to ensure reliable supplies of electricity at the lowest cost possible in markets that are truly competitive and free of market manipulation.
Perspective
FERC's Standard Market Design: Too Detailed To Evolve
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's standard market design (SMD) proposal states objectives that are important and supportable, both theoretically and empirically. Uniform rules and business practices reduce transaction costs and limit opportunities for institutional arbitrage, increase the extent of the market, and increase market liquidity and investment.
Vote Yes on Yucca Mountain
Congress needs to uphold the president's designation for a nuclear waste disposal site.
In the interest of security, economics, and common sense, it is important that Congress votes to uphold Yucca Mountain as the nation's central nuclear waste disposal facility.
Bragawatts: Nothing to Brag About
So-called 'round-trip trades' and what FERC should do about it.
Power trading companies that make the cut on the top-10 ranking list essentially have won the right to brag ... or have they?
Electricity Restructuring is No License for Central Planning
RTOs will perpetuate regional monopolies and political rate regulation.
Economists sometimes get confused - especially when the real world doesn't fit into their neat boxes.
Network industries like telephone and electricity are today's case in point. Economists have viewed these parts of the economy as requiring special attention from regulatory authorities. They're viewed as "natural" monopolies displaying "economies of scope" and characterized by risky "lock-in" or "path dependency" features. That supposedly makes them prone to abuse by their free-market owners, and therefore in need of impartial regulatory oversight.
RTOs: The Billion Dollar Advantage
ICF study shows the national benefits of RTOs are too large to be ignored.
Sixty billion dollars in benefits. Less than $6 billion in costs. In any business, those numbers mean just one thing: you've got a winner.