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LCG Publishes 2024 Annual Outlook for Texas Electricity Market (ERCOT)

LCG, October 10, 2023 – LCG Consulting (LCG) has released its annual outlook of the ERCOT wholesale electricity market for 2024, based on the most likely weather, market, transmission, and generator conditions.

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LCG Publishes 2024 Annual Outlook for Texas Electricity Market (ERCOT)

LCG, October 10, 2023 – LCG Consulting (LCG) has released its annual outlook of the ERCOT wholesale electricity market for 2024, based on the most likely weather, market, transmission, and generator conditions.

Read more

Industry News

Rates Up, But Dereg Working, Massachusetts Officials Say

LCG, Jan. 26, 2001Massachusetts electric customers are seeing two bumps in their bills this month that increase the cost of power to the average customer by 15 percent to 20 percent, but state and utility officials say deregulation is working the way it's supposed to.

One of the increases is for sharply higher fuel costs for power plants, which will cost the average householder $6.61, while another $2.00 brings the utilities up to date for fuel costs they were not allowed to pass through to consumers for the first three years of deregulation in Massachusetts.

State officials say that the higher prices are one reason deregulation is working in Massachusetts and not in California.

David O'Connor, head of the Massachusetts Division of Energy Resources, said "Everyone is grumpy, but the lights are still on here. We're taking care of our problems as they come up."

The Massachusetts Public Interest Group's Rob Sargent thinks backers of electric deregulation are looking at their handiwork from the wrong angle. "Their yardstick seems to be that it's not as bad as California, therefore it must be working," he said.

But regulators say they would rather have the utilities keep abreast of their costs, rather than be forced into insolvency, as has happened in California. They point out that the fuel costs would have been passed through to ratepayers, deregulation or not.

Also, they point out, Massachusetts is allowing new power plant construction, another sharp difference with California. O'Connor said nine new plants have been built in the past three years and eight more are scheduled to begin operation over the next few years.

"There's almost no way we will continue to see the wholesale prices we're seeing with those plants coming online," he said. "The prices have got to come down."

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