Posted on 03/06/2021 10:29:15 AM PST by Theoria
Utility commission says repricing power markets too difficult, despite recommendation that overcharges during storm be reversed
The Public Utility Commission of Texas on Friday signaled it didn’t intend to reverse $16 billion in electric overcharges that an independent market monitor had flagged as stemming from the state’s weeklong blackouts.
Commission Chairman Arthur C. D’Andrea said it was too difficult to reprice the energy markets and involved too many uncertainties.
“It is impossible to unscramble this sort of egg,” he said.
Mr. D’Andrea said there were so many hedges and private transactions outside the view of the commission that taking a step designed to help consumers might have unintended consequences. “You think you’re protecting the consumer and it turns out you’re bankrupting a co-op or a city,” he said.
The commission met Friday morning to consider a recommendation from its independent market monitor, which concluded that Texas kept wholesale prices artificially high for 33 hours longer than warranted during a winter freeze last month, resulting in $16 billion in excess charges to consumers.
Amid the freeze, which resulted in mass blackouts that left millions of households in the dark for days, the three-member panel appointed by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott ordered the state’s grid operator to raise wholesale power prices to the peak price of $9,000 per megawatt hour.
The market monitor said in a report filed Thursday that those prices should have been lowered when the grid operator stopped instituting blackouts, not when it ended the energy emergency a day and a half later. It recommended reversing $16 billion in charges.
Earlier this week, the previous commission chair, DeAnn Walker, resigned under criticism, leaving as sitting commissioners Mr. D’Andrea and Shelly Botkin, who also indicated Friday that she wasn’t inclined to order repricing.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
Behind a pay wall.
Sheila Jackson Lee could single-handedly arm spin those windmills back to full power on the coldest of days.
Sounds like shafting the common man to protect hedge funds.
Somebody has to pay for the extra power that was actually produced due to the cold. There’s no free lunch. Who is it going to be? One suggestion: make the environmentalists who blocked fossil/nuclear generating pay for the extra charges.
$16 billion over charge and they say ‘Oh, just leave it’?
ROFL, they’re going to reprice it all.
If I lived in TX, I’d be a little miffed!
And here I thought that Abbott could have a chance at the White House one day.
The lack of leadership is astounding.
So, how many Texans will be forced into bankruptcy because they continued using power at these inflated rates, or will they go to court to have it reversed, since they probably were not told how much the electricity was going to cost them during the emergency.
What’s $16,000,000,000 between friends?
Wish we could see the money trail...
Not talking about hedge funds here. Many companies and individuals hedge against rising energy costs.
Somebody has to pay for the extra power that was actually produced due to the cold. There’s no free lunch. Who is it going to be? One suggestion: make the environmentalists who blocked fossil/nuclear generating pay for the extra charges.
That last line caught my eye.......the greenies should pay it.....:)
well the citizens had a choice between how they paid for their energy to begin with knowing if rates went up they’d have higher bills....or they could basically pay a flat rate.
Sheila Jackson Lee could single-handedly arm spin those windmills back to full power on the coldest of days.
LOL...like the Wheels of Mars Rover Fortune!!
“Amid the freeze, which resulted in mass blackouts that left millions of households in the dark for days, the three-member panel appointed by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott ordered the state’s grid operator to raise wholesale power prices to the peak price of $9,000 per megawatt hour.”
Unelected government bureaucrats screw the people. Dog bites man.
§17.46(b) of the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices-Consumer Protection Act provides that it is a false, misleading or deceptive act or practice to take advantage of a disaster declared by the Governor under Chapter 418, Government Code, or the President by:
1.Selling or leasing fuel, food, medicine, lodging, building materials, construction tools, or another necessity at an exorbitant or excessive price;
or
2.Demanding an exorbitant or excessive price in connection with the sale or lease of fuel, food, medicine, lodging, building materials, construction tools, or another necessity.
Texas law absolutely requires repricing, no matter how difficult.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.