Dive Brief

• A Texas Senate committee grilled the Public Utility Commission over moves that some say could lead to a new capacity market in the state.
• Texas' energy-only market does not offer adequate incentives for building power plants to provide capacity for periods of peak demand, according to generators.
• PUC Chairwoman Donna Nelson told the committee that her goal was to keep the power on in Texas.

Dive Insight

At issue is an informal vote the PUC took in October that called for setting up a mandatory reserve margin, which some believe would lead to a capacity market. Consumer advocates and others believe a capacity market would lead to higher rates. A key lawmaker said the PUC may be moving too fast and overstepping its authority.

“We have an agency that’s starting to move in a direction where the Legislature might not have intended it to go,” said state Sen. Troy Fraser, Senate Committee on Natural Resources chairman and co-author of the legislation that deregulated Texas' electric market in 1999.