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Enron Mail |
Two of the three Commission-hired witnesses testified today -- Peter
Bradford and George Sterzinger. While Bradford did nothing to really help or hurt our cause, Sterzinger was amazingly helpful. He practically endorsed Enron's proposal. He noted that it was the best design to elicit strong conservation response by, as he put it, "grabbing hold of some of the usage and making it responsive to the manipulation of the market." The idea was that customers would respond to the high prices which, are the product of market manipulation, by reducing usage. He focused alot on the decremenatal usage credit and the incentive it would provide to conserve. He proposed an alternative manner of funding in that the rebate would be flowed back to customers as a bill reduction over an extended period of time. He also noted that he would implement the proposal as a voluntary one (at least initially). As to the other parties proposals, on cross, he expressed strong concerns about shifting usage from peak to should peak (as that does nothing but shift the peak period) and stressed that the Commission should carefully examine any rate design which would have the potential to do such. He also testified that of the two forms of conservation being discussed in this proceeding -- load shifting or load reduction -- the latter was far more important and that the goal should be to lower energy usage at all times. All in all, not a bad afternoon for our proposal. His testimony appears to have renewed interest in what was beginning to look like a nonstarter. Tomorrow, the remaining Commission witness (Bornstein) is up. Followed by Bill Marcus for TURN, and PG&E witness Coyne. The billing constraint witnesses are up Thursday. The hearing should conclude by noon on Thursday, with briefs due noon on Monday. Jeanne Bennett
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