Law Commons^™

Affordable Renewables - Unjust And Unreasonable?, Grace Brosofsky

Cornell Law Review

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC)-an independent agency tasked with ensuring 'just and reasonable" energy rates-has begun to use energy market payment systems to prop up fossil fuels. FERC has issued orders that prevent renewables from competing with fossil fuels by forcing renewables to bid into energy markets at artificially high rates. FERC has argued that state clean energy subsidies distort energy markets by "suppressing prices" and pushing "needed" fossil fuel generators out of the market. According to FERC, a federal intervention is necessary to protect "market integrity" and ensure that consumers can access reliable electricity.

This Note argues that …

Remote Control: Treaty Requirements For Regulatory Procedures, Paul Mertenskotter, Richard B. Stewart

Cornell Law Review

Modern trade agreements have come to include many and varied obligations for domestic regulation and administration. These treaty-based commitments aim primarily to improve the freedom of firms to operate in the global economy by aligning the ways in which governments regulate markets and private actors engage governments through administrative law. They therefore strike at the core of how economies are ordered and entail important distributional questions. An increasingly prevalent and diverse—but hitherto largely neglected—type of treaty obligation prescribes specific procedures for domestic administrative decision-making. This Article frames such requirements as tools of powerful states to control regulatory decision-making by government …