News Release in Docket RM16-3

December 17, 2015
News Media Contact
Craig Cano | 202-502-8680
Docket No. RM16-3
Item No. E-1

FERC Proposes Revisions to Market-Based Rate Filings
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) today proposed to revise the ownership information that sellers
must provide when seeking to obtain or retain electric market-based rate authority. The proposed reform would be less
burdensome for the industry and more useful to the Commission in assessing whether to grant such authority.
FERC permits power sales at market-based rates if the seller and its affiliates do not have, or have adequately
mitigated, horizontal and vertical market power. Currently, a seller must identify all upstream owners, and describe
the business activities of the owners and whether they are involved in the energy industry. However, the need to
comply with this requirement has forced some sellers to submit multiple amendments to their filings, resulting in extra
costs and significant processing delays for information that does not directly affect the market-power analysis.
Today’s Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NOPR) would require market-based rate sellers to provide ownership
information on only those affiliates necessary for the Commission’s assessment of horizontal or vertical market power,
and removes the need to identify other owners.
A seller would be required to identify and describe two categories of affiliate owners:
•

“Ultimate affiliate owner(s),” defined as the furthest upstream affiliate owner(s) in the ownership chain; and

•

Affiliate owners with franchised service areas or market-based rate authority, or that directly own or control
generation; transmission; intrastate natural gas transportation, storage or distribution facilities; physical coal
supply sources; or access to transportation of coal supplies.

If an affiliate owner does not fall into either of those categories, the seller would not be required to identify it in
describing its ownership structure.
The NOPR also proposes to clarify the types of ownership changes that must be reported to the Commission by sellers
that have market-based rate authority.
Comments on the NOPR are due 60 days after publication in the Federal Register.

R-16-06

(30)