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Fortnightly Magazine - April 2006

Getting IRP Right

Quantifying uncertainty in the planning process.

During the 1980s and early 1990s, integrated resource planning (IRP) was a required practice for many utilities. Then competitive wholesale markets, merchant generation, and restructuring initiatives led many utilities to abandon IRP.

While wholesale competition generally has been successful, the regulatory process changes it brought were less so. And utilities now are getting back into long-term resource planning studies to provide decision support for their “back to basics” business strategies.

Byline: 
By Mark Griffith and Fereidoon P. Sioshansi
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What's Holding Back the Nuclear Renaissance?

A compelling spokesperson, and a plan for Yucca Mountain.

The stars would seem to be aligned for a renaissance of nuclear power in the United States. Fossil-fuel prices are historically high, political uncertainty plagues the Middle East, Russia, and other oil-producing regions, new reactor technology looks promising, and President Bush is promoting nuclear among the alternatives for electric power. Indeed, opinion polls suggest the public has an increasingly positive attitude towards nuclear power.

Byline: 
By Craven Crowell
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Wall Street's Egalitarian View

Investors are making little distinction between regulated or unregulated business strategies. One banker suggests it will be difficult to stand out.

It seems history does repeat itself all too often. In the late1990s, a common complaint by utility CEOs was that utility price-to-earnings (P/E) multiples did not take into account whether a com- pany was a pure-play regulated utility, a diversified utility with a merchant subsidiary, or something else. Many say investors at the time just didn’t understand the different business models that were emerging after electric restructuring.

Byline: 
By Richard Stavros
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FERC's Tough New Rules: Survival Skills for A New Era

The nation’s first energy “top cop” and his colleague discuss important compliance implications of EPACT 2005.

In its March 2005 report to the House Energy and Commerce Committee, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) repeated its request for enhanced civil penalty authority. When Congress passed the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPACT), it granted FERC all the authority that it had requested, and more. The new director of FERC’s Office of Market Oversight and Investigations (OMOI) called the new penalty authority “awesome.”1

Byline: 
By William F. Hederman Jr. and George D. Billinson
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Smackdown! Round Three - The Bankruptcy Court vs. FERC

The jurisdictional battle over authorizing rejection of wholesale power contracts continues.

The high stakes turf battle over whether FERC or the federal bankruptcy courts have jurisdiction over rejecting wholesale power contracts is now in its third round. Round one was fought in 2003 in the NRG bankruptcy case and ended in a settlement among the parties. Round two followed with the Mirant Chapter 11 case. Now punches and counterpunches are flying in round three: the Calpine bankruptcy.

Byline: 

Howard L. Siegel

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