Subject: re : letter sent to the iso on creditworthiness
this article appears to be addressing the letter sent by steve hall , via the iep , to the caiso . its good reading .
- kit
published thursday , august 16 , 2001
group questions power payments
power crisis
by mike taugher
contra costa times
an industry trade group asked market officials on wednesday why they have failed to pay more than $ 1 billion for power sold during april and may .
" for some reason , the money is not getting from the ratepayers to the generators , " said jan smutny - jones , director of the independent energy producers association . " our hope is that this is a temporary misunderstanding . "
part of the answer , officials said , is that the state ' s power - buying agency is refusing to pay its bills in full until it gets more information about who ultimately receives the cash .
compounding the problem is the fact that when the may bills began coming due earlier this month , some market participants who were owed money from previous months credited their own accounts instead of paying in full , according to the independent system operator .
that left the iso less able to pay its may bills , said iso president and ceo terry winter in a written statement .
" the iso acknowledges that past debt is due , " winter said in the statement .
winter said the iso would respond more fully to address questions about the underpayments by friday . but in response to the iep letter , he demanded that market participants quit crediting their own bills .
the iso runs the spot markets in california . buyers and sellers make their bids through the iso , which sets the market price based on those bids , collects payments from the buyers and divvies them up to the sellers .
the issue came to a head wednesday when the iep sent a letter to the iso , demanding to know why generators were not paid in full for electricity sold in april and may . smutny - jones said estimates of unpaid amounts during that period ranged around $ 1 . 2 billion .
in early april , federal regulations went into effect that essentially barred the financially broke utilities from buying power in the iso market . that forced the state department of water resources , which began buying electricity in january , to pick up the entire unmet need of the utilities ' customers .
dwr spokesman oscar hidalgo said that the state is required to compile certain information about bills it pays before it pays them .
" we haven ' t been given what we feel is an adequate accounting of what we ' re going to be paid for , " hidalgo said . " we are working with the iso to see how we can get some of that information that we ' re not getting . "
iso spokesman gregg fishman said his agency is working with the water department , but that market tariffs require that some information be kept confidential .
" we can ' t tell one market participant what another market participant is doing , " fishman said .
- - - - - original message - - - - -
from : hall , steve c .
sent : tuesday , august 14 , 2001 3 : 55 pm
to : belden , tim ; yoder , christian ; o ' neil , murray p . ; foster , chris h . ;
williams iii , bill ; stokley , chris ; blair , kit
subject : fw : letter sent to the iso on creditworthiness
iep decided to send our letter to the iso inquiring about the creditworthiness of certain scs , like cdwr . let ' s see what happens .
steve
- - - - - original message - - - - -
from : mara , susan
sent : tuesday , august 14 , 2001 2 : 32 pm
to : hall , steve c .
subject : fw : letter sent to the iso on creditworthiness
- - - - - original message - - - - -
from : katie kaplan [ mailto : kaplan @ iepa . com ]
sent : tuesday , august 14 , 2001 11 : 11 am
to : alan comnes ( e - mail ) ; bill woods ( e - mail ) ; bob ellery ( e - mail ) ;
brian t . cragg ( e - mail ) ; carolyn a baker ( e - mail ) ; curtis hatton
( e - mail ) ; curtis kebler ( e - mail ) ; parquet , david ; ' dean nistetter ' ;
douglas kerner ( e - mail ) ; duane nelsen ( e - mail ) ; ' ed wheless ' ; eric
eisenman ( e - mail ) ; george vaughn ( e - mail ) ; greg blue ( e - mail ) ; jack
pigott ( e - mail ) ; ' joann van buren ' ; joe ronan ( e - mail ) ; john g . larrea
( e - mail ) ; ken hoffman ( e - mail ) ; kent palmerton ( e - mail ) ; fillinger ,
mark ; mark j . smith ( e - mail ) ; marty mcfadden ( e - mail ) ; nam nguyen
( e - mail ) ; ' rachel king ' ; randall j . hickok ( e - mail ) ; roger pelote
( e - mail ) ; ross ain ( e - mail ) ; scott sadler ( e - mail ) ; steve ponder
( e - mail ) ; steve schleimer ( e - mail ) ; susan j mara ( e - mail ) ; tom hartman
( e - mail ) ; ward scobee ( e - mail ) ; william hall ( e - mail )
cc : andy brown ( e - mail ) ; ' carol hudson ( e - mail ) ' ; ' jan smutny - jones
( e - mail ) ' ; jean munoz ( e - mail ) ; ' katie kaplan ( e - mail ) ' ; sandra moseley
( e - mail ) ; ' steven kelly ( e - mail ) ' ; thomas r . mcmorrow ( e - mail )
subject : letter sent to the iso on creditworthiness
greetings :
attached please find the final letter sent to the iso on creditworthiness .
thank you to all who provided input and feedback on the letter .
thanks ,
katie kaplan
manager of state policy affairs
independent energy producers association
( 916 ) 448 - 9499