FERC recently dismissed the New England Ratepayers Association’s petition for declaratory order requesting FERC to exert jurisdiction over certain net-metering transactions. The decision leaves some key legal and jurisdictional questions about net metering unanswered. For now, FERC’s existing view that net-metering transactions are subject to state commissions’ retail sales jurisdiction, unless a customer sells more power back to the utility than it consumes in the applicable retail billing period (usually one month), remains intact.
FERC, CFTC, and State Energy Law Developments
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued Order 569‑A on May 21, significantly revising the methodology used to analyze the base return on equity (ROE) of a public utility’s rates under the Federal Power Act. Because the order remains subject to further legal challenge and FERC had last revised its guidance on acceptable methodologies six months earlier in Order 569, uncertainty in acceptable methodologies may continue for some time.
