2009-012-RES-ENDORSING CERTAIN LEGISLATIVE CHANGES TO ENHANCE COMPETITIVE ELECTRIC MARKET

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WHEREAS, the City endorses efforts proposed by CAPP to modify the electric deregulation legislation to enhance competition, implement the original intent of SB 7 and reduce costs to the City and its residents. 1VOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PARIS, TEXAS, THAT: Section 1. The findings set out in the preamble to this resolution are hereby in all things. Section 2. The City supports the introduction and adoption of legislation in the 81St Session of the Texas State Legislature that promotes affordable power and the transition of the Texas electric market from a deregulated market to a fully competitive one. Specifically, the City supports legislation that will address the following issues: • All generators, regardless of size, should explicitly be barred from the unlawful exercise of market power. • Ownership and control of generation capacity should be limited to no more than twenty percent (20%) of total generation capacity within the market in order to enhance competition and mitigate market power and the ability of any one generator to affect prices. This is in accordance with basic anti-trust principles and as originally designed in SB 7, although the "market" should be redefined as the functional market (an ERCOT zone) to reflect real-world conditions. In the alternative, the PUC should be directed to create a single ERCOT-wide market with uniform congestion pricing. • Entities such as municipalities, commercial customers or retail electric providers harmed by wholesale market abuse should be given explicit standing to participate in market power abuse enforcement actions brought by the PUC. • Cities should be permitted to create citizen aggregation groups to combine the power needs of residents that have not specifically asked to be excluded in order to facilitate bulk power purchasing and enhance the opportunities for residential customers to benefit from deregulation and benefit the entire state by increasing competition. Citizens who have signed a contract with a retail provider would be excluded, as would those citizens who otherwise opt out. • All efforts to transition to a nodal market in ERCOT should be abandoned and other market design options that benefit all market participants should be considered.