The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has cleared Duke Energy and 100 other energy companies of any wrongdoing during the 2000-01 western states energy crisis. California submitted a 3 000 page report to FERC in March detailing its reasons for claiming that several of the nation's biggest power providers were responsible for the energy crisis. Although the report's findings have not been made public, California officials have made public their beleif that some power plant operators deliberately shut down functional plants, reducing supply and driving up prices. In all, California accused electricity sellers of overcharging utilities, ratepayers and the state at least $7.5 billion.
However FERC report that Duke Energy, which owns four power plants in the state, "adequately explained" why outages occurred at its facilities between May 2000 and June 2001. Duke officials said they had little incentive to shut down the plants because the company had locked much of its power into long-term deals with electricity purchasers. "So far, every time the facts have been put on the table regarding Duke Energy's California operations, they support what we've said all along, that we acted appropriately" said Duke spokesman Peter Sheffield Most of the other companies cleared did not have a significant impact on California's energy market, but FERC is still investigation four other major energy concerns, including AES, Williams, Dynegy, Mirant and Reliant Resources.
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