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To: Zeev Hed who wrote (65077)	12/23/2000 1:00:28 AM
From: B.K.Myers	Respond to of 99985

Zeev, The problems at Southern California Edison and Pacific Gas & Electric are sad indeed. <<The summer's electricity crisis forced the state's three investor-owned utilities to purchase wholesale electricity costing $6 billion more than what they could charge consumers under existing rates. Southern California Edison and Pacific Gas & Electric now want consumers to pay the full cost of those purchases in the form of monthly surcharges over the next five years--a plan that would push into the distant future any hope that deregulation would bring relief to the high-cost California electricity market. But state officials and Wall Street experts doubt the industry has any realistic chance of collecting all $6 billion. Despite their confident public stand, the utilities will likely settle with consumers. "I'd say the chances of utilities being made whole is zero, and the chances of them eating all the undercollections is zero," said Steve Fetter, an analyst with debt raters Fitch of New York.>> consumerwatchdog.org I have to wonder how they call it deregulation when a government panel tells you what you can charge your customers. The higher price that they are paying for electricity now could have been used to build new power plants over the past 10 years. Did you see where California's energy problem causes some plants, such as Kaiser Aluminum Corp., to shut down and sell their electricity to California? washingtonpost.com Tuesday's meeting should be interesting! B.K.