Norman Bay, President Obama’s nominee for chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, is about to get his day in the Senate, along with acting FERC Chairwoman Cheryl LaFleur. Obama nominated Bay, the director of FERC’s Office of Enforcement, on Jan. 30. The president nominated LaFleur to a second five-year term May 1.
It is Obama’s second attempt at filling the chairmanship left vacant since former Chairman Jon Wellinghoff’s term expired. Former Colorado regulator Ron Binz withdrew his nomination in October after failing to win enough support from the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, which will conduct the confirmation hearing for Bay and LaFleur May 20.
Wellinghoff, an ally of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), reportedly lobbied for the nomination of Bay, a former U.S. attorney whom Wellinghoff brought to the commission in 2009.
Committee Chair Mary Landrieu (D-La.), said last week she was impressed with Bay, calling him “very, very knowledgeable about energy markets and structure.” Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), however, expressed concern about Bay’s energy experience. Unlike most FERC commissioners in the last decade, Bay has never served as a state utility regulator. Bay had no energy experience before joining FERC. (See FERC Pick a Blank Slate.)
Bay also may face tough questioning over the commission’s enforcement policies, which some critics have labeled heavy-handed. (See FERC, CFTC Reject Due Process Complaints.)
More: E&E Daily
TVA Cutting 10% Of Workforce
The Tennessee Valley Authority is cutting more than 10% of its workforce through early retirements, attrition and layoffs, its largest staff reduction in more than 20 years.
The federal utility, which has accepted 750 early retirements and won’t fill 1,000 vacant positions, said layoffs will be announced later this year. The company will also lay off 390 Bechtel contract workers from the Wyatt Bar Nuclear Plant in Texas. Staffing levels are at 12,612, down from 51,709 in the 1980s.
TVA says the cuts are necessary to bring staffing levels and electric rates in line with other utilities as power consumption in its service territory drops. TVA President Bill Johnson says he wants a $500 million reduction in annual expenses by next year. TVA supplies power to about 9 million people in Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky, Georgia, North Carolina and Virginia.
More: Mississippi Business News
DOE Awards Grants To NJ, Va. Wind Farms
The proposed Fishermen’s Energy project off the coast of Atlantic City and Dominion Resources’ project off Virginia Beach each will receive up to $47 million in federal funding, the Department of Energy announced last week.
Fishermen’s Energy won the grant even though the $188 million project was rejected by New Jersey regulators, who said it would cost utility customers too much. The company wants to build five 5-MW turbines as a laboratory for researchers to learn about offshore wind and investigate interactions between turbines.
The company’s chairman Dan Cohen said the grant was a recognition that “No other project in America is more prepared to put steel in the waters.” A spokesman for the Board of Public Utilities said he could not comment on the grant, noting that Fishermen’s Energy is appealing the agency’s rejection in state court.
Dominion’s project is a 12-MW wind farm to be built 26 miles off the coast of Virginia Beach. It will demonstrate installation, operation and maintenance methods for wind turbines located far from shore, and test hurricane-resistant designs.
A third project to be built off the Oregon coast will also get federal money, the Department of Energy said.
More: Department of Energy; NJ Spotlight
NRC Clears Exelon of Cleanup Fund Violations
The Nuclear Energy Regulatory Commission is backing off allegations that Exelon purposely violated reporting regulations regarding its nuclear decommissioning funds.
The NRC last year charged that Exelon purposely misled regulators about the funds, but in a ruling issued May 1, it said that it found “insufficient evidence to support a conclusion that Exelon officials acted willfully.” The NRC ruling went on to say, however, that the inaccurate reports in 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2009 about the amount of money in the decommissioning funds was “avoidable.”
More: Crain’s Chicago Business
White House Solar Array Goes Live … Finally
The solar array project atop the White House, a project started in 2010, went live last week, White House officials said. It is expected that President Obama will use the installation in announcements this week about further government-backed solar projects. A White House spokesperson described the solar array as capable of generating 6.3 kW and is “part of an energy retrofit that will improve the overall energy efficiency of the building.”
Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz called the installation “a really important message that solar is here. We are doing it, we can do a lot more.”
More: The Washington Post