The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) has rejected claims that an experimental performance-based rate plan for San Diego Gas and Electric Co., a combined electric and natural gas utility, was yielding "perverse results" and should be modified in keeping with the PUC's purposes in establishing the experiment. According to the Utility Consumers' Action Network, the utility had earned a profit that exceeded its authorized return by 114 basis points while the plan was in effect.

The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PUC) has authorized Duquesne Light Co. to expand its economic development rate initiatives to include small industrial customers. The new rate rider provides a five-year discount on demand charges on a maximum of 100 kilowatts (Kw) for new or existing customers smaller than 100 Kw. If the utility's service territory is to recover from the steel industry's devastating downturn, the PUC argued, Duquesne must be able to offer a competitive rate to keep industrial operations of all sizes.

While the cost of common household goods like bread and milk increased 77 and 50 percent, respectively, from 1985 to 1995, the average residential electricity bill for customers of San Diego Gas & Electric Co. (SDG&E) dropped 13.6 percent over the same period, according to San Diego Chamber of Commerce statistics.

That trend shows no sign of abating. In fact, low rates are fast becoming a staple for the utility's 1.2 million electric customers.

Lawmakers see different imperatives than regulators or industry execs, such as protecting the tax base for the local community.

APPA Director Alan Richardson will fight

toe-to-toe with well-heeled

adversaries. If he were a boxer, his name might be Alan "The Right" Richardson.

The executive director of the American Public Power Association (APPA) always toes the canvas, swinging for equity for his 1,750 members, shadowing its "heavyweight" adversaries, investor-owned electric utilities (IOUs).

Gas restructuring didn't end with Order 636, it just outran the regulators. Now the rules come from the downstream dealmakers.

R & D for

a Competitive Power Industry

The secret lies in gaining exclusive-use rights to protect your product or process from your competitors.

The electric utility industry is inherently a high-technology business. Those who ignore this fact for long will fall behind (em not only in using the technology, but also in contending against their higher-tech competitors.

The term "parachute payment" includes "any payment in the nature of compensation to . . . a disqualified individual . . .

For purposes of this section, an individual is a disqualified individual . . . if . . . the individual is an employee or independent contractor of the corporation and is

a) A shareholder [More than $1 million or one percent of fair market value]

b) An officer, or

c) A highly compensated individual

. . . .

The term 'officer' implies continuity of service. ...

At the end of May, Consumers Power Co. issued a press release that caught my eye. In four short paragraphs, the company said it had filed an application with the state public service commission (PSC) seeking approval of a private power-supply contract with James River Corp. Consumers Power ranks James River as its 23rd largest industrial electric customer.