The Maine Public Utilities Commission (PUC) has approved a regulatory reform plan for New England Telephone and Telegraph Co., a telephone local exchange carrier (LEC). The plan includes a price cap program for "core" services (em that is, nondiscretionary services such as basic exchange and toll services. The price-cap structure and pricing rules will not apply to the LEC's noncore services.
Efforts to site new facilities for the disposal of hazardous waste (HW) and radioactive waste have met with utter paralysis. HW disposal companies have spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to site new landfills and incinerators for this waste, but most of this money has gone down the drain. Since the enactment of the chief federal law on HW, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976 (RCRA), only one new HW landfill has opened on a new site in the United States (in prophetically named Last Chance, CO).
New business opportunities, improved internal communications, and energy information services: three solid reasons electric utilities should form a telecommunications strategy (if they haven't already). Yet, while these motivations are compelling, none really demands utility participation.
For the first time, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has issued opinions disallowing income tax allowances in the cost of service with respect to income from limited partnership interests held by individuals. In Lakehead Pipe Line Co., Ltd. Partnership, the FERC found that allowing a tax allowance for limited partnerships made up of individuals would give the investors an after-tax return on equity higher than they are entitled to (Docket Nos. IS92-27-000, et al.).
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has adopted a final rule for nuclear plant decommissioning trust funds that will allow greater investment flexibility and enable funds to take advantage of changing market conditions (Docket No. RM94-14-000). The rule aims to improve the returns earned on funds contributed through wholesale electric rates, thereby decreasing the amount collected from ratepayers.
Close Close Percent 52-Wk 52-Wk Div Div Book P/E Last
Company Region 03/31/95 06/30/95 Change High Low Rate Yield Value Ratio 12 Mos.Electric Utilities
AEP Company Inc. Midwest 31.75 35.13 10.63 35.75 29.00 2.40 6.83 22.68 13 2.68
Unicom Corp. Midwest 23.75 26.63 12.11 27.75 20.63 1.60 6.01 24.39 14 1.90
Union Electric Co.
In an important case involving electric retail competition, the New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission (PUC) has made a series of legal rulings favoring a proposal by Freedom Electric Power Co. to purchase and resell power to end users currently served by Public Service Co. of New Hampshire (PSNH). The PUC ruled that franchises granted to electric utilities in the state are not exclusive and that the proposed activities would make the energy company a public utility if approved and implemented.
Phillip S. Cross
