{"id":20239,"date":"2012-10-25T16:59:20","date_gmt":"2012-10-25T21:59:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/?p=20239"},"modified":"2012-10-25T17:31:43","modified_gmt":"2012-10-25T22:31:43","slug":"higher-offer-cap-approved-by-public-utility-commission","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/10\/25\/higher-offer-cap-approved-by-public-utility-commission\/","title":{"rendered":"Higher Wholesale Power Prices Approved By Public Utility Commission"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_20242\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 200px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/10\/25\/higher-offer-cap-approved-by-public-utility-commission\/germany-expands-its-electricity-network\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-20242\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-20242\" title=\"Germany Expands Its Electricity Network\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/10\/149978367-200x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"200\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/10\/149978367-200x300.jpg 200w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2012\/10\/149978367.jpg 396w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Photo by Sean Gallup\/Getty Images<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Higher limits for wholesale power prices were approved by the Public Utility Commission today.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>The <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/topic\/public-utility-commission-of-texas\/\">Public Utility Commission of Texas<\/a>, which oversees electricity in the state, voted today to raise the limit on how much power providers can charge.<\/p>\n<p>That price \u2013 known as the <a href=\"http:\/\/interchange.puc.state.tx.us\/WebApp\/Interchange\/Documents\/40268_71_737286.PDF\">offer cap<\/a> \u2013 happens when the grid gets stretched to capacity. It\u2019s essentially the maximum amount companies can charge for wholesale power. Today the commission tripled the cap from its level of $3,000 earlier in the year to $9,000. (Earlier this summer the commission<a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/06\/28\/p-u-c-approves-higher-prices-for-wholesale-electricity\/\"> increased<\/a> the offer cap to<a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/07\/17\/not-enough-even-higher-price-for-electricity-urged-for-texas\/\"> $4,500.<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p>The hope is that higher profits for generators will result in new power plants. The Texas grid is predicted to <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/10\/23\/some-good-news-for-the-texas-grid-weve-got-a-few-more-years-until-things-get-dicey\/\">fall below its target level of power reserves in a few years<\/a>, and with low profits for power plants right now, new plants just aren\u2019t being built in Texas\u2019 private, energy-only market.<\/p>\n<p>Some consumer and trade groups are opposed to the change, as it\u00a0isn\u2019t clear what kind of impact the higher wholesale prices could have on residential customers. The Texas Industrial Energy Consumer group said in a memo to the commission that if the $9,000 price caps were in place during the long, hot year of 2011, it would have added 80 percent to wholesale power prices, an <a href=\"http:\/\/interchange.puc.state.tx.us\/WebApp\/Interchange\/Documents\/40268_43_728656.PDF\">overall increase of\u00a0$13.3 to $14 billion<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Public Utility Commission of Texas, which oversees electricity in the state, voted today to raise the limit on how much power providers can charge. That price \u2013 known as the offer cap \u2013 happens when the grid gets stretched to capacity. It\u2019s essentially the maximum amount companies can charge for wholesale power. Today the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50,"featured_media":20242,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[60],"tags":[14,41],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20239"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20239"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20239\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20246,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20239\/revisions\/20246"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20242"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}