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SPP and Member Utilities Successfully Achieve Western Expansion Milestone

LCG, April 2, 2026--Southwest Power Pool (SPP) today announced that the expansion of its service territory into the Western Interconnection has been a success. The milestone makes SPP the first regional transmission organization (RTO) with services spanning the Eastern and Western Interconnections. Its member organizations, which cover all or part of 17 states, can now benefit from a more operationally and geographically diverse integrated system.

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Holtec Achieves Milestone towards Restarting Palisades Nuclear Facility and Advances Plans to Build Two SMRs at Palisades Site

LCG, March 31, 2026--Holtec International yesterday announced that it successfully completed a milestone test necessary to return Holtec's Palisades Nuclear Generating Station to service. The 805-MW pressurized water reactor (PWR) is located in Michigan and was shut down by Entergy in May 2022. Holtec acquired the facility in June 2022 and has pursued a path to return the plant to service.

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Industry News

FERC Threatens Trading Licenses of Energy Companies

LCG, June 5, 2002--Today the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) warned that the trading licenses of four companies were in jeopardy due their lack of cooperation in an electricity market investigation.

Williams Cos. Ltd., El Paso Electric, which is independent of El Paso Corporation, Avista Corp., and Portland General Electric Co. were ordered to "show cause why the commission should not revoke their market-based rate authority" within ten days. According to FERC, the companies failed to properly respond to an order requiring that they state whether or not they had participated in manipulative market practices.

FERC's order, signed by three commissioners, said that the four energy traders' responses were "indicative of a failure by these companies to cooperate with our investigation."

Williams was told that it did not answer the original order in a straightforward manner, a statement that Williams contests.

Over 100 companies are under scrutiny in FERC's investigation, which came after memos were released relating Enron trading strategies to market manipulation. The Enron strategies in question include "ricochet," which called for selling electricity out-of-state prior to selling it in-state for the purposes of avoiding price caps and increasing profit.

FERC asserts that trading records from Portland General link that company and Avista to manipulative practices and that trading between the companies were "designed to further the Ricochet and Death Star trading strategies."

Although a public memo refers to $7.3 million in joint revenue between El Paso Electric and Enron, El Paso claimed a mere ball-park $700,000 in its affidavit to FERC and ignorance to any Enron actions taken on its behalf, which FERC asserts is "simply not credible."

Stocks of the four companies are seeing negative effects from the FERC order.

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