press releases
For Immediate Release: June 27, 2016
Contact: Regina L. Davis, 202-898-9382, rdavis@naruc.org
WASHINGTON—Members of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners are scheduled to speak today and Tuesday at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s technical conference, Competitive Transmission Development Rates.
Two state utility commissioners, Richard S. Mroz, president of the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities, and Angela Weber of the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission, will represent state perspectives on panels related to competitive transmission development processes, including cost containment provisions, the relationship of competitive transmission development to transmission incentives and other ratemaking issues.
“State utility commissioners are increasingly asking whether those responsible for selecting transmission projects are relying to the degree necessary on measures that discipline costs and appropriately apportion risk to those responsible for the development of transmission facilities,” said NARUC President Travis Kavulla of Montana.
“Additionally, FERC’s technical conference comes at a time when seams issues between planning regions continue to raise questions about whether transmission is being planned for and built in an economically efficient manner. I am grateful that FERC has initiated this conference, and pleased that the agency has invited so many representatives of states to the table.”
President Mroz will speak on the first panel, “Cost Containment Provisions in Competitive Transmission Development Processes.” Commissioner Weber will sit on Tuesday’s fourth panel, “Interregional Transmission Coordination Issues.”
Along with the commissioners, Raj Addepalli, managing director of Utility Rates and Services at the New York State Public Service Commission, will participate in the second panel, “Commission Consideration of Rates That Contain Cost Containment Provisions and Result from Competitive Transmission Development Processes.”
Two other representatives of states, with whom NARUC members frequently collaborate, will also speak. They are Maury Galbraith and Heather Hunt, executive directors, respectively, of the Western Interstate Energy Board and the New England States Committee on Electricity.
As noted on the FERC notice, the conference also provided the opportunity to discuss issues relating to interregional transmission coordination, regional transmission planning and other transmission development issues. More information is available on FERC’s website at http://1.usa.gov/296ccuD.
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NARUC is a non-profit organization founded in 1889 whose members include the governmental agencies that are engaged in the regulation of utilities and carriers in the fifty States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. NARUC's member agencies regulate telecommunications, energy, and water utilities. NARUC represents the interests of State public utility commissions before the three branches of the Federal government.
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