Consumer advocates, utility chiefs, regulators, and analysts offered conflicting visions of retail competition's future at NASUCA's 1996 Capitol Hill Conference.

The National Association of State Consumer Advocates ( NASUCA) conference, "Restructuring the Electric Industry: What Are the Costs and Benefits to Consumers?," was held on February 29 and March 1 in the Rayburn House Office Building. The event was co-sponsored by Rep.

As utilities refocus resources on their core business, they are developing strategic partners to manage day-to-day support services more efficiently. Operational functions that received scant notice in the past are now identified as areas for big savings.

Transportation services mark one such area. Activities like vehicle acquisition, resale, maintenance, fueling, and routine administration are now widely viewed as outsourcing opportunities (em to reduce costs and enhance productivity.

To an outsourcing company, offering services to utilities to manage their motor vehicle fleets may seem like a simple economic proposition. "We can do it better and cheaper," the outsourcers say.

But it's not that easy. Thorny issues arise (em in economics, quality, administration, and labor relations. And they must be faced head on.

Few utilities today have avoided outsourcing one function or another in the effort to cut costs. Some utilities have been burned.

The 129 federally owned plants that make up the five PMAs generate about 6 percent of the electricity sold in the United States.1 By law, the PMAs sell wholesale power at cost to legally stipulated "preference customers" (em i.e., municipal utilities and rural electric cooperatives.

Seventeen former Florida Power Corp. (FPC) employees have filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Ocala against the utility, alleging age discrimination. Plaintiffs claim that most of the workers who lost jobs in restructuring layoffs are over 40, and were targeted because of high salaries or costly illnesses. If certified as a class-action lawsuit, plaintiffs say as many as 1,000 workers laid off since 1993 may join them. FPC disputes that estimate, claiming that the ages of the laid-off workers ranged from the 20's to the 60's. (em LB t

Lori A.

U.S. District Court Judge John E. Sprizzo has ruled that Niagara Mohawk Power Corp. (NiMo) has no right to demand "adequate assurances" from independent power producers (IPPs) that unsecured tracking account balances will be repaid. The decision stems from a series of lawsuits filed by IPPs in response to a February 1994 letter from NiMo threatening contract repudiation unless the assurances were given (Ecogen Four Partners v.

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The Margaret Chase Smith Center for Public Policy's Project for the Study of Public Regulation and the Environment, Maine's Future Energy Policy, Augusta Civic Center, Augusta, ME

(207) 581-1539

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Association of Energy Engineers, The New Power Market: Opportunities for Producers, Sellers & Users of

The James River Corp.'s Dixie Cup manufacturing plant in Darlington, SC, has declined a $1-million rate cut offered by Carolina Power & Light Co. Dixie Cup, which hopes to slash its electric bill by $700,000 a year, or $4.9 million over seven years, said the offer was only one-fifth what it needs. Meanwhile, it has asked the City of Darlington to municipalize its electric system. Dixie Cup has asked for a citizen referendum; the city council is awaiting the outcome of a municipalization feasibility study.

Deregulation places the cost, safety, and reliability of the U.S. electric utility industry at risk. So says the Utility Workers Union of America, AFL-CIO, which represents 50,000 workers at 74 utilities. A UWUA position paper warns that competition could cause shortages and high prices: "This is the standard business cycle.... There is no reason to believe that the laws of supply and demand have been repealed." The paper proposes 11 tenets for restructuring:

s Provide competition for all.

s Respect state control.

A Moody's report, Legal Disaggregation Threatens Bondholder Security, warns that bondholders (em previously secured by a blanket lien on substantially all of a utility's property (em may find themselves secured solely by generating assets, whose real market value may be less than the outstanding secured debt. Moody's identifies 14 companies that may spin off transmission and distribution (T&D) assets, retaining generating assets because of indenture restrictions.