Hi Jeff,
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Did you get my email last week?
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I really hate the fact that questions of fact are so hard to  get answered, 
because nobody seems to be able to answer energy issue questions  that aren't 
tinged with political implications. It seems to me that certain  questions 
ought to be answerable purely on the basis of simple empirical  fact.
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For example, in the paper today it says "San Diego Gas &  Electric was the 
first utility to sell its power plants, and under the  deregulation law was 
then freed from the state-imposed rate caps."
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Thus, is the problem with PG&E that it never sold ALL its  plants? I know it 
sold some (the one near us, Moss Landing, is owned by Duke,  for example.) So 
was the sole reason PG&E was unable to raise their rates to  meet their costs 
of buying energy the fact that it hadn't sold all its plants?  If so, does 
that mean, say, if PG&E had kept 1% of its plants, and the other  99% of the 
power it sold it had to buy on the unregulated wholesale market, it  would 
have been prevented from raising its rates for 100% of the power it sold  (or 
resold)?to its customers? If so, what WAS the percentage of power  plants 
PG&E DIDN'T sell? Did they try to sell these? Were they just unable  to find 
any buyers? You'd think, with the amount of money they claimed to be  losing 
everyday, they could have GIVEN those plants away and made money off the  
deal. What is wrong with my understanding here?
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Rory
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