March Madness has nothing over the Northeast Public Power Associations legislative efforts when it comes to fast-paced, high-scoring and prominent presentations crammed into a three-day period!

Over 33 NEPPA members and representatives met with 31 congressional offices between the 10th and 13th of March to bring New England’s public power message to the Hill.  Meeting with Senators and Congressmen the delegation emphasized that the rising electricity prices in New England are harmful to the economy as well as to our citizen consumers.  The message that the market just isn’t a market and isn’t working was repeated in numerous venues.  Though some carried messages concerning their states as well as the NEPPA message all covered the following items: 

• ISO-New England’s Forward Capacity Market – PI is the wrong solution
• Action needs to be taken on the Administrative Law Judges ruling stating that transmission incentives are unjust and unreasonable and need to be lowered
• Fix the CFTC sub-threshold for swaps in the energy supply market; know that the electric utility industry takes grid security seriously and is pro-actively working with NERC and FERC to establish and support standards developed through these processes
• Last but not least – while we support renewable energy and believe it has a place in the power supply arena all customers need to pay their fair share of building and maintaining the utility grid.

Through the New Hampshire Electric Co-Ops great relationship with Senator Shaheen’s office, NEPPA secured the Senator’s willingness to take the lead on a letter to FERC asking the Commission to fairly investigate all proposals regarding forward capacity markets that are before them.  NEPPA’s Washington lobbyists are shepherding this effort, refining the message of the letter while working with APPA to make sure our delegation is carrying the right signal to the FERC Commissioners.  

And going the extra mile on our behalf, Brian Forshaw participated in a panel on Thursday to give a briefing targeted toward House staff to educate them on our concerns with the energy markets and why they aren’t working.  Jolene Thompson of AMP Ohio and Elise Kaplan of APPA rounded out the panel.

Spearheaded by the Legislative Committee, a huge thank you is due to everyone who participated in the Rally and helped make our visits a success.  Larry Brownell did an outstanding job of co-coordinating the Hill visits and our DC colleagues at Morgan Meguire, Lori Pickford and Elizabeth Kelsey, kept us on point every step of the way.  

For more information feel free to contact Sharon A. Staz, Chair, Legislative Committee at sastaz@klpd.org.