Frontlines
Will a back-to-basics strategy meet investor expectations?
It's an issue that is coming to the fore with greater force-the debate over how utilities should honor their obligation to stockholders. But this time there seems to be quite a difference of opinion over strategy-or so we found in our annual finance issue.
Regarding “Consolidating Co-ops,” June 2004
Imported natural gas contains more Btus and fewer impurities than the domestic variety, raising questions for LNG development.
Frontlines
Did FERC's market power ruling go too far?
Will utility executives and proponents of electric competition mark July 8, 2004, as a dark day? That was the day the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) said it would make no changes to the extremely contentious "interim" screen-the one it adopted back in April to measure market power in electric generation.
Frontlines
Critics say FERC's filed rate doctrine is wrong for the times.
It's quite remarkable how the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has been able to pound a square peg into a round hole. With not much more than a wink and a smile, FERC has taken a depression-era law meant for monopolies-the Federal Power Act (FPA)-and has made it serve double duty as a foundation for competitive power markets.
Letters to the Editor
To the Editor:
Frontlines
The U.S. faces a near doubling of population this century. Will there be enough power for the people?
On this the 75th anniversary of its publication, -a journal that has sought out the truth through its investigation and understanding, been a place for knowledge and scholarship, and been a medium for intellectual discourse within the energy industry-looks out to the future.
In 2004, the quintessential question remains what it was 75 years ago: How will the energy industry meet the demands of tomorrow?
Frontlines
Utilities have little to show for the millions they pay in campaign contributions.
If Donald Trump could call Congress on the carpet, he would send lawmakers packing with those two now infamous words, "You're fired!"
Trump, at the conclusion of each episode of his reality TV show "The Apprentice," dumps an unlucky job candidate for failing to complete that show's business assignment to his liking.
Letters to the Editor
To the Editor:
The article "NERC's Cloudy Crystal Ball" () contends that the North American Electric Reliability Council (NERC) has consistently underestimated the growth in U.S. electricity demand. The only evidence offered for this conclusion is that observed data did not encircle the 45-degree line in a graph of actual vs. forecast percentage growth rates. Conjectures such as this are invalid for numerous reasons.
Frontlines
Electricity rates may be heading skyward sooner than we think.
Are state regulators in danger of bringing about the thing they most fear-higher electricity rates? Critics charge that some regulators seem to be opening up the cookie jar, letting utilities have as they please with no supervision.