Utility briefs

Electrical Apparatus, Apr 2007

News about Kansas utility board censored

Two Kansas City newspapers were recently ordered by a judge to refrain from publishing articles about the operations of the Board of Public Utilities of Kansas, Kansas City, Kan.

The Kansas City Star and The Pitch, a Kansas City alternative weekly, were both preparing articles for print and had posted articles on their Web sites that were based on a document prepared by an attorney working for the utility.

According to The Pitch, the document concerned issues having to do with the utility's power plants.

A temporary restraining order prohibiting publication was issued by Jackson County Circuit Judge Kelly Moorhouse March 2.

The utility claimed that the document was confidential and contained privileged information. The Pitch claimed that the document had been obtained legally.

"To have a published story pulled from our Web site is unprecedented and unbelievable," Kansas City Star editor Mark Zieman told Editor & Publisher magazine.

Insider trading alleged in TXU buyout

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filed suit in Chicago March 2 charging insider trading in connection with the recent buyout of Texas utility TXU Corp.

Investigators say there were "highly profitable and suspicious" purchases of options on TXU stock at the Chicago Board Options Exchange immediately prior to the Feb. 26 announcement of TXU's takeover by private equity firms. The utility's stock jumped 13% the day the buyout was made public.

The SEC won a court order freezing $5.4 million in assets of the unknown purchasers of TXU call options. Buyers of the options could not immediately be identified, because the purchases were made through brokerages in Switzerland, Germany, and the U.K.

End to closed-door meetings sought

A member of the Georgia Public Service Commission in Atlanta is seeking to put an end to closed-door meetings between members of the Commission and representatives of the companies they oversee.

Commission member Angela Speir has proposed that any conversation between a member of the five-person panel and someone with an interest in a case under consideration be held in a public meeting. "We're talking about issues that are worth billions of dollars to Georgia rate payers," Speir told the Associated Press.

Critics say backroom deals between commissioners and utility lobbyists have already impeded the public's ability to follow the decisions the commission makes.

Wind power marketer accused of overpricing

Xcel Energy, Inc., of Minneapolis, a developer and marketer of wind-generated electric power, is being accused of asking too high a price from customers in North Dakota.

A program under development by Xcel Energy would offer North Dakota customers 100 kilowatt-hour blocks of wind energy for about $3 if they agreed to buy power for at least a year.

Dean Hulse, a wind energy advocate, told the Associated Press that North Dakota electric cooperatives with similar marketing programs charge much less. Cass County Electric Cooperative, for example, charges 50 cents for 100 kilowatt-hours, while Capital Electric Cooperative charges $1.

An Xcel Energy representative says the less-expensive wind power comes from turbines that were cheaper to build than Xcel Energy's newer models.

Edited by the EA staff