The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has approved a final rule on charges and fees for hydroelectric projects. Annual charges will now be assessed beginning on the date construction starts rather than when a license is issued (Docket No. RM-93-7-000). The rule eliminates annual charges for minor licensees (em projects of 1.5 megawatts or less (em and caps annual charges at two percent of total costs incurred by the FERC. To update its regulation, the FERC also substituted kilowatts for horsepower to determine capacity. For the meantime, the FERC has retained the formula for allocating costs to major licensees, and said it would continue to use separate pools in calculating costs for municipal and nonmunicipal license holders. However, the Commission plans to consider those issues in a future proceeding.
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.