Regulation

Market Design Helps People Attain Goals Effectively

Michael Giberson Harvard economic systems designer Al Roth is profiled in the Boston Globe: Academically speaking, Roth is a pioneer of so-called market design: finding situations where a market is failing — often, a place that most people wouldn’t even recognize as a market — and making it work better. Roth has influenced a cadre …

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Update: Industry, Environmental Group Working on Shale Gas Drilling Rules

Michael Giberson Last November we noted that industry and environmental groups in Texas were working together on fracking disclosure rules. Earlier this month a bill was introduced in the Texas House that would establish disclosure rules for fracking fluids. Kate Galbraith reports in The Texas Tribune, “Texas Could Require Disclosure of Drilling Chemicals“: Hydraulic fracturing, an …

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Meanwhile, More “Power Market and the State” Battles in New Jersey and Maryland

Michael Giberson And if Andrew Kleit thinks that the Pennsylvania state government is toying with a bad idea (see previous post), look what is going on next door in New Jersey and Maryland. In New Jersey: “Utilities challenge New Jersey law while preparing to reap its benefits.” In January the Governor signed a law which …

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Would a ‘pennsylvania Power Authority’ Be Good for Pennsylvanians?

Michael Giberson Also in the Spring 2011 issue of Regulation magazine is Andrew Kleit’s article on a proposed Pennsylvania Power Authority. In the course of explaining why such a state power agency would be a bad idea, Kleit explains a lot about how the wholesale power market works in Pennsylvania (and elsewhere). Noteworthy is Kleit’s …

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Update on “Will Faking a Consumer Cartel Help Make Power Markets More Efficient?”

Michael Giberson Last September I asked, “Will faking a consumer cartel help make power markets more efficient?“, “Does FERC really want to go down this path?” and “Do they really think that faking a consumer cartel will help make wholesale power markets work more efficiently?” The answer to the first question is “no, it won’t make markets …

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Price Gouging News Roundup (march 2011)

Michael Giberson ABC News last week tackled the question, “Are Gas Stations Price Gouging?” (2:23 min. video) Surprisingly, I liked this story, though (and probably because) they mostly sidestep their question about price gouging and instead go in pursuit of “the highest priced gasoline in America.” They find it at a convenience store just outside …

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Progress Toward a Alaska Natural Gas Pipeline Thwarted by Shale Gas

Michael Giberson In February, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission made its eleventh report to the U.S. Congress on the status of efforts to build a natural gas pipeline in Alaska. The twice-annual reports are required by the Energy Policy Act of 2005. Three efforts to bring gas from the North Slope of Alaska to market …

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Fracking Wastewater Not Causing Radioactivity Issues in Pennsylvia Rivers

Michael Giberson The recent New York Times series on natural gas fracking suggested that poorly treated produced water was being discharged into streams and rivers in Pennsylvania, and that disposal of produced water was a larger environmental issue than groundwater contamination from poorly completed wells. A key concern raised in both industry and regulator documents …

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New York Times Article Advances Public View of Environmental Issues Surrounding Hydrofracking

Michael Giberson At first it seemed like just another newspaper article on the potential environmental dangers of fracking to produce natural gas from shale, but on second look there is something new in the New York Times article, “Regulation Lax as Gas Wells’ Tainted Water Hits Rivers.” Most such stories, and much of the public’s …

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Zone Pricing Ban Proposal Advances in Connecticut, Zone Price Ban Law in New York Still Not Working

Michael Giberson Gasoline consumers in well-off Fairfield County, CT, pay gasoline prices that tend to be higher than prices in the rest of the state. The consumers don’t like it. State legislators representing the region believe the issue is “zone pricing,” a practice by gasoline wholesalers which sets wholesale prices to different levels in different …

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