Social and Behavioral Sciences | Open Access Articles

Pricing Challenges Facing Maine’S Utility Regulators, Thomas L. Welch Jan 1994

Pricing Challenges Facing Maine’S Utility Regulators, Thomas L. Welch

Maine Policy Review

Decisions concerning the pricing of public utilities are rarely made without controversy. Electric utilities have garnered the lion's share of the attention in recent months because of the rising cost to consumers of electricity, despite surplus generating capacity and relatively cheap power available on the open market. But other regulated utilities—natural gas, telecommunications, and water—also face important pricing issues in the months ahead. The 1994 conference, sponsored by the Margaret Chase Smith Policy Center's Project for the Study of Public Regulation and the Environment [PURE], explored several of these issues earlier this year. An important Maine perspective on pricing issues …

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Regulatory Updates: Maine Public Utilities Commission, Land Use Regulatory Commission, Ralph Townsend, Ruth Robinson Jan 1994

Regulatory Updates: Maine Public Utilities Commission, Land Use Regulatory Commission, Ralph Townsend, Ruth Robinson

Maine Policy Review

No abstract provided.

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Electric Competition And The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Donald F. Santa Jr. Jan 1994

Electric Competition And The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Donald F. Santa Jr.

Maine Policy Review

The pricing of electric power is not only an issue at the state level, it also gathers the attention of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. A major pricing issue now facing FERC involves electric transmission. This reflects increased competition in the electric generation business and is of particular concern in the wholesale electricity market, which is regulated by FERC. As FERC Commissioner Donald F. Santa makes clear in this article, access to transmission lines and the price to be paid for that access are extremely important issues to independent power producers. This article is based on Commissioner Santa's keynote speech …

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Assessing Maine’S Eram Experiment, Leslie Hudson, Stephanie Seguino Jan 1994

Assessing Maine’S Eram Experiment, Leslie Hudson, Stephanie Seguino

Maine Policy Review

Maine’s utility regulators have occasionally ventured into the uncharted waters of utility regulation reform. Some such efforts have been more successful than others. Leslie Hudson and Stephanie Seguino document the process and outcomes of one such attempt at alternative electric utility regulation, the Electric Revenue Adjustment Mechanism, or ERAM. They endeavor to answer several questions arising from this brief and failed, but interesting regulatory experiment.

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Retail Competition In The U.S. Electricity Industry, John P. Hughes Jan 1994

Retail Competition In The U.S. Electricity Industry, John P. Hughes

Maine Policy Review

The ever-increasing competitive nature of the electric utility business has been lent additional impetus by federal policies that mandate restructuring of the industry. John Hughes, writing from the perspective of large industrial consumers, offers a vision for restructuring the electric utility industry. He frames his vision in response to goals outlines in the California Public Utilities Commission’s proposal to restructure that state’s electric utility industry

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Regulatory Updates: Maine Public Utilities Commission, Ralph Townsend Jan 1994