compliance

Giving Credit Where Credit is Due

Ensuring State Emission Reduction in Clean Power Plan

Strong public policy favors giving states credit for the carbon reductions they make while the Plan’s legality is pending.

A Holistic Cyber Strategy

Security must be organizational – simply complying will leave you vulnerable.

Workforce Management: Because standards are aimed only at critical assets, cyber security must be holistic – with all employees involved.

Market Manipulation: The Business Questions

Ten points to remember for compliance and employee training.

Without a clear definition of market manipulation, or a detailed description for prohibited conduct, market participants are often left with more questions than answers.

Market Manipulation: Staying a Step Ahead

Law, compliance, and case management – plus the blurred boundary between FERC and CFTC.

In the aftermath of 2000-2001 energy crisis, Congress provided federal regulators more authority to crack down on fraud. To do so, FERC must show that the actor possessed the requisite state of mind and establish a connection between the alleged manipulative action and an interstate transportation or sale for resale of natural gas or electricity.

Commenting on Carbon

State PUCs take on EPA and its Clean Power Plan.

Everything about the Clean Power Plan seems surreal. States complain of unfair treatment. Regulators read the proposed rule and sound warnings of a coming apocalypse.

From Coal to Gas

Regulatory and environmental challenges for power plant conversions under the EPA’s Clean Power Plan.

Converting a power plant from coal to natural gas triggers a host of environmental challenges and regulatory issues. Operators could be trading one set of regulatory obligations, liabilities, and costs for another, equally problematic, set of liabilities and costs.

Triggering & Tailoring

What the Supreme Court said, and didn’t.

Justice Scalia saw the need for tailoring as proof that EPA’s Triggering Rule was mistaken.

The Politics of Carbon

Supreme Court may ultimately clarify EPA’s authority under Clean Power Plan.

The Supreme Court questions federal agency authority over greenhouse gas emissions in the recent case of Utility Air Regulatory Group v. EPA.

In the Crosshairs

Protecting substations and transformers after the PG&E Metcalf attack.

The latest fallout from the April 2013 Metcalf incident: the unprecedented assault with high-powered rifles on PG&E’s Metcalf substation, in Silicon Valley, which disabled 17 of 20 large transformers.

Toward a 21st Century Grid

Producing value with advanced distribution management systems.

Changing demands from regulators, customers, and shareholders are driving utilities toward better operational technologies to manage an increasingly complex grid. Advanced distribution management systems (ADMS) promise nearly real-time operational insight for maintaining reliability, safety, and security.