As a former member of the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission and a
Harrisburg resident, I was disappointed with your June 11 editorial
"Smoking Gun." In it, you incorrectly state that Federal Energy
Regulatory Commission Chairman Pat Wood "failed to respond in a timely
effective fashion as the California energy crises unfolded." In addition,
you claim that little has been done to ensure that it never happens again. As the California energy crisis unfolded Pat Wood was chairman of the Texas
version of the PUC. Let me assure you his jurisdiction never extended to the
California market. In June of 2001, Pat and I were appointed to the FERC. One of our first votes
was to issue an order which imposed West-wide price caps and a
generation-must-run order. Even former California Gov. Gray Davis credits Pat
and me with bringing sanity to the California energy market. In fact, a New York Times story on June 13 stated, "unfortunately for
Enron, Mr. Bush's picks for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Patrick
Wood III and Nora Brownell, moved quickly to impose price caps throughout the
Western United States after they took office in summer 2001, a move that helped
break the back of the power crisis." Should the FERC have acted sooner? Absolutely! Do not, however, blame Pat
Wood; he was in Texas at the time. You state there is little to suggest that a serious effort has been made to
ensure that it never happens again. Once again the facts say otherwise. Since Pat and I were appointed, we and the other FERC commissioners have
adopted a myriad of market rules designed to ensure that we never have another
"California." Specifically, we established new standards of conduct
for the electric market. We have provided incentives to encourage needed
infrastructure investment and we have initiated efforts to standardize market
rules. Most important, we have taken steps to change the culture of the agency; to
make the agency more proactive and less reactive. The most visible of these
steps is the creation of an Office of Market Oversight and Investigations whose
sole function is to protect customers by identifying and correcting market
problems before they can impact customers. Balanced market rules and vigilant market oversight will not solve all of
California's energy problems. Californians need something that we as
Pennsylvanians occasionally take for granted: infrastructure. California needs
to put more steel in the ground. They need to build more generation; more
transmission capacity; and more pipelines; and, they need to do it quickly. The FERC, now under the leadership of Pat Wood, remains committed to ensuring
fair and competitive power markets across the nation. NORA MEAD BROWNELL is a
member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.