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Has the deregulation of the energy industry gone into reverse?

Energy deregulation was a central theme of the 1990s, a trend that swept the developed world as ways to liberate markets were sought out in the wake of seemingly-successful deregulation efforts elsewhere in the economy in the preceding decade. No longer would customers pay out regulated, regular rates to monopoly corporations with lengthy planning timelines and no incentive to cut costs or employees. Creative destruction was the name of the game, and politicians and power regulators got roughly half-way through rewriting the rules of power markets before the implosion of Enron put the brakes on efforts at further deregulation, which have been halting and piecemeal. Keep reading →


Every few years a word comes along that means more in the context of the day than it usually does in the dictionary; it becomes the catch-all term that encompasses and typifies a cultural moment, and business leaders and regulators find themselves using it constantly as a kind of shorthand.

In the media business that word has been “social,” in the internet business it has been “cloud” and in the financial business it has been “securitization.” Each speaks to an underlying set of assumptions and practices that force change in industries and reflect shifts in the broader world’s understanding of an organization’s role and purpose. Keep reading →


The energy business increasingly operates in a world of “black swans.”

In one year, earthquakes, floods, financial chaos and political deadlock all at enormous scale have rocked the energy industry. While most firms remain functioning, or even prosperous, and regulators have responded with speed, the analysts charged with finding logic in data are scrambling to figure out how to price and plan for a new future filled with “unusual” events. Keep reading →


The roles of government and business in driving energy investment are areas of continual debate, but this week brought the turmoil to a new high.

The Department of Energy and the Obama Administration went on the offensive to defend their renewable energy and clean tech programs, many of them funded or arranged under previous administrations but implemented and promoted by current leaders. Keep reading →

Natural gas prices will remain little-changed from their current levels over the remainder of the year and into 2012, analysts said as they review the fuel’s recovery from a slight dip in May amid a broader commodities sell-off and ahead of first-half 2011 financial results.


Low and comparatively stable natural gas markets are widely held to be structuring the impending future of the US power sector, limiting the uptake of more-expensive renewable fuels and easing the impacts of emissions limits that could impose new costs on power plants. The fuel’s accessibility and pricing has attracted the attention of alternative-fuel vehicle manufacturers, who propose a new transport system based on natural gas rather than refined petroleum. Keep reading →


Most of us live and work in cities, even when those cities don’t always correspond to the popular image of tall buildings and rushing crowds.


As the world urbanizes at an historic pace, countries that began the industrialization cycle more than a century ago are struggling to match creaking and multi-layered infrastructures with growing and shifting requirements for plentiful and affordable electricity. Keep reading →

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