Become a PUF Member Organization

Law & Lawyers

Who's Up-and-Coming in Utility Regulation and Policy?

Nominate the most promising of the next generation of leaders in our business.

You all really got into my March 22nd column on the ten most influential in our business since 1990. I received a flood of e-mails from you. 

You wanted to add this FERC chairman or that utility executive, this RTO founder or that thought leader. Or subtract someone that was on my initial list.

The column two days later summarized your comments. Did that put an end to the matter? No way. It only egged you on. Another flood of e-mails came in. There was even an organized write-in campaign, it was leaked to me, for a certain RTO founder.

Byline: 

Steve Mitnick

Read Entire Article

Baseball Standings by Utility

Exelon Orioles, Cubs, White Sox, Phillies and Nationals on pace for a 104 win season.

The electricity for five major league baseball teams is delivered by Exelon. The Baltimore Orioles, Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox, Philadelphia Phillies and Washington Nationals. 

When all five teams are playing at home, Exelon lights a third of baseball. 

Three other utilities deliver electricity to two teams in the majors. Con Ed delivers to the New York Mets and New York Yankees. Pacific Gas and Electric delivers to the Oakland Athletics and San Francisco Giants. Xcel Energy delivers to the Colorado Rockies and Minnesota Twins. 

Byline: 

Steve Mitnick

Read Entire Article

Sun Spot: Residential Solar per Friday's Energy Dept. Data

In extremely optimistic scenario for residential solar growth, output would still fall below 1% of 2020 electricity supply

Residential rooftop solar increased its output from 1.6 million megawatt-hours in the first four months of 2015 to 2.4 million megawatt-hours in the first four months of 2016. This according to the latest data of the Energy Department released Friday.

It's a large increase in percentage. Output from rooftops increased fifty percent. 

At this high rate of increase, if it continued, January - April output would be 3.6 million in 2017, 5.4 million in 2018, 8.1 million in 2019, and 12.2 million in 2020.

Read Entire Article

Energy Dept. data is hot hot hot

Monday, we peaked at 708 thousand MWH and used 14.1 million overall that day

How you feelin'? The latest Energy Dept. data says, hot hot hot.

US electricity use was 94.9 million megawatt-hours in the week ending July 22, 2016. 

Continental US. Sorry Hawaii and Alaska. 

That's 4.1 percent higher than the comparable week last July. And 9.4 percent higher than three weeks earlier, the week ending June 27.

Byline: 

Steve Mitnick

Read Entire Article

Housing Market Drives Electric Market

New houses use much more electricity and drive electricity consumption growth.

Want to know why electricity consumption isn't growing that much? Look no further than the Census Department stats on new single-family houses.

In 2015, 648 thousand new single-family houses were completed nationally. That's up forty-five percent from 2011. But down sixty-one percent from 2006.

Why is the housing recovery from 2011 and lingering housing recession from 2006 so important for us in utility regulation and policy? 

Byline: 

Steve Mitnick

Read Entire Article

President-elect Trump and Utilities

What the election means for utility regulation and policy.

Last week, Donald Trump was elected President. 

OK, you knew that.

By now, you’ve read the speculation about what this means for all the aspects of domestic and foreign affairs. Sure, the impact on trade, immigration and jobs might be important to some folks. But you care about what this means for utility regulation and policy.

First, it seems likely that natural gas production and pipeline development will maintain its pace if not increase. There will probably be less tolerance for the efforts of opponents. Though those efforts could become more confrontational. 

Byline: 

Steve Mitnick

Read Entire Article

For Decades, Real Electric Price Has Fallen in South, Midwest, Northeast

If residential electricity had increased at the rate of general inflation since 1977, it would be around 13.66 cents per kilowatt-hour, over a penny higher than it is.

As we said in yesterday's column, the Labor Department just published December 2016's Consumer Price Index. The CPI for all consumer goods and services was up 2.1 percent from the prior December. The CPI for residential electric service was up 0.7 percent. 

The wide gap between the CPI for all goods and services and for electric service, 1.4 percent, means the real price for electricity fell significantly. 

Read Entire Article

Light Bulb Cartel

They secretly fixed light bulb life in 1924 at a thousand hours

The IEEE Spectrum article posted by Markus Krajewski of the University of Basel, Switzerland, opens like a mystery thriller (posted September 24, 2014). The secret meeting in Geneva 92 years ago still haunts how we light our world today.  

All the major manufacturers of lightbulbs met to split up the world market among them. Soon enough they found a way to accelerate the market's expansion as well:

"In carefully crafting a lightbulb with a relatively short life span, the cartel thus hatched the industrial strategy now known as planned obsolescence."

Byline: 

Steve Mitnick

Read Entire Article

More Electricity Horror Movies

Frankenstein, The Day the Earth Stood Still, Maximum Overdrive, The Brave Little Toaster

Last Friday's "Today from Public Utilities Fortnightly," summarizing four electricity horror movies, stirred many of you to find more such flicks. Here's four:

Frankenstein (1931)

The first Frankenstein film was a 16-minute picture created in 1910 by Edison Studios. Thomas Edison may have been the producer.

In the legendary 1931 film, scientist Henry Frankenstein and assistant Fritz assemble a human body from parts collected from around their European village. Frankenstein wants to create human life through electrical devices he's "innovated." 

Byline: 

Steve Mitnick

Read Entire Article

FERC Fun: March 2016 Crossword Puzzle answers

Spoiler alert! Here’s the answers to this month’s crossword puzzle, FERC Fun, page 37, March issue of Public Utilities Fortnightly.

Across

5. order one ___: thousand

7. watcher of RTO: monitor

9. ___ charge adjustment: annual

11. planning for the whole east: eipc

12. how many megawatts can go: atc

13. in charge of a hearing: alj

14. agency before FERC: fpc

16. accepted as a power plant: qf

17. contract you can count on: firm

18. lines that FERC approves: pipelines

20. big gas law: ngpa

21. depression era law: puhca

23. Carter law: purpa

26. region without markets: south

27. supply's opposite: demand 

Byline: 

Steve Mitnick

Read Entire Article