Utility Dive

Competitive power suppliers “finally got what they wanted and apparently now recognize what was obvious to the MOPR opponents – discarding state policies is not a durable solution,” Ari Peskoe, Director of Harvard University’s Electricity Law Initiative told Utility Dive in an email. “If one state’s utilities exit, all that the merchants gain from the MOPR expansion disappears.”

The technical feasibility of such a shift is not clear, Ari Peskoe, director of the Electricity Law Initiative at the Harvard Law School Environmental and Energy Law Program. told Utility Dive. Most rooftop solar would likely fall under the jurisdiction of PURPA as a qualifying facility, and therefore be priced based on the avoided cost of generating that power, argued the petition.

The argument that FERC’s failure to define the relationship may open a loophole for market manipulation is “plausible,” Ari Peskoe, director of the Electricity Law Initiative at Harvard told Utility Dive in an email, though he’s not sure how real and present that threat may be.

The argument that FERC’s failure to define the relationship may open a loophole for market manipulation is “plausible,” Ari Peskoe, director of the Electricity Law Initiative at Harvard told Utility Dive in an email, though he’s not sure how real and present that threat may be.

“This is the second one of these substitution auctions that are supposed to induce old resources like Merrimack to retire and get paid for doing so, and allow a clean energy resources to substitute in and take that capacity obligation,” Ari Peskoe, director of the Electricity Law Initiative at Harvard Law School told Utility Dive. The PJM Interconnection also has in place a controversial mechanism intended to curb the influence of state-driven resource incentives.

“There’s been a lot of grumbling about FERC’s practices of sitting on these rehearing requests,” Ari Peskoe, director of Harvard University’s Electricity Law Initiative, told Utility Dive.

“It is not easy to engage on these issues, they’re very technical,” Ari Peskoe, director of Harvard University’s Electricity Law Initiative, told Utility Dive. “A first step is just making people aware of the existence of this organization.”

PURPA acted as a “backstop” for QFs in non-market regions, said Ari Peskoe, director of the Electricity Law Initiative at Harvard Law School, on Twitter. “FERC’s proposal would reduce competition in these regions, reinforce utility dominance, and harm innovation.”