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On February 11, 2020, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit (“Fourth Circuit”) held that FERC’s claim for civil penalties under the Federal Power Act (“FPA”) against Powhatan Energy Fund, LLC and certain of its traders and affiliates (“Powhatan”) was not barred by the statute of limitations. In doing so, the Fourth Circuit held that FERC’s claim in federal district court did not accrue for statute of limitation purposes until all of the legal prerequisites for filing the suit had been met, including failure by Powhatan to pay its assessed penalties.  …
Continue Reading Fourth Circuit Rules FERC Acted Within Statute of Limitations in Enforcement Action Against Powhatan Energy

On January 10, 2020, FERC issued two separate orders approving Stipulation and Consent Agreements (“Agreements”) between the Office of Enforcement (“Enforcement”) and Emera Energy Incorporated (“Emera Energy”) and Exelon Generation Company, LLC (“Exelon”), respectively. Both Agreements relate to alleged violations of ISO New England Inc.’s (“ISO-NE”) Tariff. Specifically, with respect to Emera Energy, FERC alleged that Emera Energy violated the Tariff’s requirement that evidence supporting Fuel Price Adjustment Requests (“FPA Requests”) must reflect an arm’s length transaction. With respect to Exelon, FERC alleged that Exelon misreported the type and quantity of start-up fuel used by its Mystic 7 generating unit (“Mystic 7”). In both cases, FERC found that the Agreements were in the public interest and the Enforcement investigations were resolved on fair and equitable terms.
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Continue Reading FERC Issues Two Orders Approving Civil Penalties and Disgorgement of Profits for Violations of ISO New England Inc.’s Tariff

On December 6, 2019, a bipartisan group of ten U.S. Senators wrote to FERC Chairman Neil Chatterjee asking for assurances that FERC fully appreciates the threat posed to the nation’s energy infrastructure by the use of equipment manufactured by Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. (“Huawei”).  The letter praised FERC’s creation of a new cybersecurity division and expressed hope that the new division’s first objective would be defending the nation’s infrastructure against threats posed by the use of Huawei’s equipment.…
Continue Reading Bipartisan Group of Senators Seek FERC Assurances Regarding Huawei Equipment Threat

On November 21, 2019, FERC’s Office of Enforcement (“OE”) released its thirteenth annual Report on Enforcement (“Report”) to provide an update about its activities during the last fiscal year (i.e., 12-months ending September 30, 2019; hereinafter “FY2019”). The Report provides an overview of, and statistics reflecting, the activities of OE’s Divisions of Investigations (“DOI”), Division of Audits and Accounting (“DAA”), Division of Analytics and Surveillance (“DAS”), and Division of Energy Market Oversight (“DEMO”).…
Continue Reading FERC Issues 2019 Report on Enforcement

On September 19, 2019, one Independent and four Democratic Senators wrote a letter to FERC which expressed concerns over recent actions taken by FERC and which directed a series of questions to FERC regarding the “apparent erosion” of FERC’s role in preventing fraud and manipulation in U.S. energy and financial markets (see October 3, 2019 edition of the WER). The concerns expressed by the senators related to (i) the decline in the number of civil penalty actions initiated by FERC; (ii) the closing of FERC’s Division of Energy Market Oversight (“DEMO”), and (iii) FERC’s ending its policy on issuing Notices of Alleged Violations (“NAVs”) regarding investigations.…
Continue Reading FERC Commissioners Respond to Senate Inquiries on FERC’s Enforcement Role

On November 1, 2019 FERC approved a Stipulation and Consent Agreement between its Office of Enforcement (“OE”), the regional reliability entity Texas Reliability Entity, Inc. (“Texas RE”), the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (“NERC”), and Calpine Corporation (“Calpine”), related to Calpine’s alleged violations of NERC reliability standards governing maintenance and testing of batteries and other protection systems, as well as provisions of the California Independent System Operator Corporation (“CAISO”) Tariff requiring entities to report planned and unplanned generator outages. As part of the settlement, Calpine neither admitted nor denied the alleged violations, but agreed to pay civil penalties of $375,000 to Texas RE and $25,000 to the United States Treasury, and to undergo compliance monitoring.…
Continue Reading Calpine Corp. Settles FERC Investigation of Battery Testing and Outage Issues

On October 25, 2019, FERC found that Vitol, Inc. (“Vitol”) and one of its traders, Federico Corteggiano, violated the Federal Power Act (“FPA”) and FERC’s rules prohibiting energy market manipulation by importing power at a loss from October 28 through November 1, 2013, at the border of the California Independent System Operator Corporation’s (“CAISO”) wholesale electric market in order to relieve transmission congestion and to benefit Vitol’s congestion revenue rights (“CRRs”) sourced at that location. The order follows an investigation into Vitol’s and Corteggiano’s trading practices that was initiated in 2014 by FERC’s Office of Enforcement. In July 2019, following the completion of Enforcement Staff’s investigation, FERC issued an order directing Vitol and Corteggiano to show cause why they should not be assessed Enforcement Staff’s recommended civil penalties of $6 million and $800,000 respectively, and directing Vitol to show cause why it should not disgorge $1,227,143 in unjust profits. FERC’s October 25 order affirmed Enforcement Staff’s conclusion that Vitol and Corteggiano engaged in market manipulation, and ordered Vitol to disgorge $1,227,143 in unjust profits. However, FERC significantly reduced Vitol’s civil penalty to $1.5 million and increased Corteggiano’s civil penalty to $1 million after concluding that Corteggiano was primarily responsible for the manipulative conduct.…
Continue Reading FERC Orders Civil Penalties and Disgorgement of Profits in Cross-Market Manipulation Investigation

On September 19, 2019, one Independent and four Democratic U.S. Senators wrote a letter to FERC asking for an explanation of three actions the Senators believed showed an “apparent erosion” of the “vital role” FERC plays in preventing fraud and manipulation in U.S. energy markets and financial markets: (1) the decline in FERC-initiated civil penalty actions and the abrupt termination of non-public investigations without explanation; (2) the elimination of the Division of Energy Market Oversight (“DEMO”); and (3) the rescission of its policy on issuing Notices of Alleged Violations (“NAVs”) for investigations. Those Senators were Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Edward Markey (D-MA), and Angus King (I-ME).
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Continue Reading U.S. Senators Ask FERC to Explain “Apparent Erosion” of FERC’s Role in Preventing Market Manipulation

On August 27, 2019, FERC staff and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (“NERC”) staff (collectively, “Staff”) jointly issued a white paper on Notices of Penalty (“NOP”) for violating Critical Infrastructure Protection (“CIP”) Reliability Standards, which details requirements for Bulk Power System cyber security.  Staff elected to draft the white paper in response to the increase in Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”) requests for the disclosure of non-public information in CIP NOPs, such as the identity of the CIP violator.  The overarching objective of the proposal is to provide increased transparency, while protecting sensitive security information that could jeopardize the Bulk Power System if made public.  If approved, the proposal will not have a retroactive effect on pending matters, or CIP NOPs already filed with the Commission.
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Continue Reading FERC and NERC Issue Joint White Paper on Notices of Penalty for Violating Critical Infrastructure Protection Reliability Standards

On July 19, 2019, FERC largely denied four complaints filed in May and June of 2015 (“2015 Complaints”) concerning the results of the Midcontinent Independent System Operator, Inc.’s (“MISO”) 2015/16 Planning Resource Auction (“2015/16 Auction”) for Local Resource Zone 4 (“Zone 4”).  In relevant part, FERC: (1) found that the results of the 2015/16 Auction for Zone 4 were just and reasonable; and (2) denied requests to hold an evidentiary hearing to resolve issues related to the 2015/16 Auction.  Specifically, FERC found no evidence in the record indicating that certain Auction offers violated the MISO Tariff, and the resulting Zone 4 auction-clearing price was just and reasonable.…
Continue Reading FERC Addresses Complaints Regarding Market Manipulation in MISO 2015/16 Capacity Auction