Study Group: FERC Fossil Fuel Experts: Lawyers (?)

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's recently issued Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on the Standards of Conduct applicable to natural gas and electric transmission providers would establish revised standards for preventing anti-competitive information sharing between those trasmission...

The Surface Transportation Board has proposed to change its methodology for calculating the railroad industry cost of capital.  The cost of capital is used for several regulatory purposes.  Lowering the cost of capital, as proposed by the agency, could increase the rate relief available to...

Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court's decision in Popowsky underscores the importance of rate-related benefits in demonstrating that a proposed merger affords sufficient "affirmative benefits" to satisfy the statutory "public interest" standard. Popowsky indicates that promises of continued "good corporate...

-- D.C. Circuit decision in National Fuel Gas Supply Corp. v. FERC vacates and remands Order No. 2004 as applied to natural gas pipelines. -- The Commission's theoretical concerns with potential anti-competitive conduct, without actual evidence of such conduct, were insufficient to justify imposing...

FERC's Kern River decision opens the door to future changes in the Commission's traditional DCF model for setting pipeline equity returns. FERC indicates a willingness to consider future DCF proxy groups that include properly adjusted MLP distributions. FERC also indicates a willingness to consider...