The Commission approved a plan to increase the availability of direct access. The plan implements provisions of SB695. Specifically, the plan provides that effective April 11, 2010, qualifying non-residential customers will be permitted to participate in direct access subject to phased annual caps. The phased-in increase will work as follows: 35% of total allowable DA sales will be permitted in year one, 35% in year two, 20% in year three, and 10% in year four. At the end of the phase-in period, approximately 11% of total retail sales will be served by competitive providers. The full text of the Plan is available at this hotlink.

The Electric Rate Relief Panel Report was released last week following meetings in January and February of certain stakeholders to address high electric rates in the state. The Report sets forth a series of recommendations including: 1) Ending retail competition for residential customers while retaining a competitive market for business customers; 2) Revising electric utilities’ procurement to permit them to buy power components separately, contract directly with generators, and allow long-term contracting; 3) Reducing the time period in laddered contracts for standard service offer customers; 4) Establishing a public power authority to procure power for small and medium size customers; and 5) Adopting a retail competitor code of conduct for participants in the retail electric market(competitive suppliers, aggregators, and brokers). The House Energy and Technology Committee plans to raise a bill on electric rate relief including the report recommendations and that it will hold a public hearing to gather comment on the recommendations. The full text of the Report is available on the NEM Website.

The Maryland House of Representatives is holding hearings today on two proposed bills to provide marketers with customer lists (HB1340) and to implement consumer education (HB1372). The Maryland Senate held a hearing on a customer list bill (SB799) on Tuesday and will have a hearing on a consumer education bill (SB942) next Wednesday. This bill's chief sponsor is Senator Catherine Pugh. NEM has filed testimony in support of the legislation and participated in the Senate's Tuesday hearing. The full text of NEM's Testimony is available on the NEM Website.

The Commission decided to review the policies and the appropriate extent of natural gas hedging by the utilities for the summer storage injection season for the period April 2010 through October 2010. The Commission will also determine to determine whether to require the implementation of a temporary hedging program to reduce the risk of higher prices during the winter heating season. The utilities were directed to answer the following questions:

"1) Compare the weighted average cost of sales gas during the most recent heating season with the weighted average cost of gas for the prior two heating seasons.
2) Provide a summary of the Utility’s assessment of the gas market’s operational and financial characteristics during the upcoming gas year.
3) Provide an estimate to the Utility’s total needed volume of gas for the upcoming year.
4) Of that volume, how much is expected to be acquired during the injection season?
i. How does that compare to injection volumes during the prior two injection seasons?
ii. What price does the company expect to pay for storage gas?
iii. How does the price compare to historical prices during the previous two injection seasons.
b. Of that volume, how much is expected to be acquired during the next heating season?
i. How does that compare to flowing volumes during the prior two injection seasons?
ii. What price does the company expect to pay for flowing gas?
iii. How does the price compare to historical prices during the previous two heating seasons.
5) In the absence of any specific Commission direction, what are the Utility’s hedging plans for the upcoming gas year?
a. If the Utility plans to use financial hedging instruments for either storage gas or flowing winter gas, provide an evaluation of why the use of various financial hedging instruments such as futures, options, swaps is or is not beneficial for customers.
6) In the event the Commission orders a 2010 Summer Storage Injection Season hedging plan, provide an estimated timeframe to implement a summer hedging program for 2010, and a percentage of the summer storage which would be appropriate to include in a 2010 summer hedging program.
7) For each year that the Utility used financial hedges, provide a comparison of the weighted average cost of gas that resulted from the Utility’s procurement practices with an estimate of the weighted cost of gas in the absence of any financial hedging.
8) For a multi-jurisdictional Utility, for each of the past three gas years, compare the gas acquisition practices and the resulting weighting average cost of gas in Maryland with the acquisition practices and the resulting weighting average cost of gas experienced in each of the Utility’s other jurisdictions."

The full text of the Notice Initiating Proceeding is available at this hotlink.