DISQUS

Asian Energy Advisors: We Have Complex Work To Do

  • MrGam · 9 months ago
    I agree with Nancy and subscribe to your crowd-sourcing idea although I have never participated in one. Two nights of cramming for the ERC hearing in Cebu on the ERC/PSALM petition brought me to your site. I wish I had found it earlier. I was able to refer your observation about the TOU implementation of the proposed increase and noticed that the ERC PA suggested an across-the-board implementation or what they called the "peanut butter" implementation.

    Upon the suggestion of the ERC Commissioner, NPC/PSALM lawyers and their witnesses agreed with some intervenors to try a non-adversarial approach to this complex and complicated issue of rate setting for power. Nancy's post and what I gathered from this blog made it easy for me to agree to the suggestion and even offered to look for a venue where virtual meetings and exchange of ideas could take place. Would this be a start of you crowd-sourcing proposal? How do we proceed? I have uploaded some NPC files at http://rpweb.ph/Uploads/erc_files/ERC_2009004RC...

    My profile may also be found at http://reklamo.ph/maritimewatchkeeper/ and why I am interested in the stuff that you have here may also be explained at http://among.reklamo.ph

    Yes, we have some complex work to do....
  • Nick Nichols · 9 months ago
    MrGam - Thanks for the comments and for the update of what happened at the Cebu Hearings. That's very helpful

    I'm totally stumped by what Commissioner Reyes meant by "non-adversarial approach" but having the parties conference among themselves and then come back to subsequently continue the Hearing process is a common regulatory technique for reaching solutions.

    The "peanut butter" approach to the rate design is precisely what the Napocor filing requested. In fact, their filing used that term, specifically. So it sounds as if the ERC staff is supporting the NPC approach. But I'm not sure why they would support that. And frankly it doesn't matter what the staff thinks. The Commission is perfectly capable of disagreeing with their own staff and in fact that happens surprisingly often in the U.S.

    Well, I suppose this is already the start of crowdsourcing the ERC case. It may seem as if this is a conversation between two people, but I can promise you many others are reading it and already putting it to use.

    There are a number of ways to better facilitate a wider exchange of ideas. We could try some. Let me think a bit. I'll propose something. Others can suggest here also. Maybe it's not too late to get something going on this case.
  • MrGam · 9 months ago
    Actually, the Commissioner's suggestion was for the petitioners to make an effort to make a presentation of their case to the intervenors which could help in the faster resolution of issues and perhaps reduce the time spent in the formal hearings. I was the one that called it a "non-adversarial approach" because I already had in mind your crowdsourcing proposal. The hearing did bring together people that could start forming the crowd. Picking up from Nancy's message, we need to have collaborators to form the crowd and not adversaries raring to defend their positions in cyberspace.

    This was also my response to Commissioner Rauf Tan's tongue-in-cheek observation during a break in the hearings when he noticed me requesting to load a file into the laptop of a PSALM officer. Jokingly, he smiled and said "That is called sleeping with the enemy.", to which I replied, "No, this is non-adversarial engagement."