Utility council needs power

Philadelphia Inquirer: Congress and First Energy Corp., the Ohio utility largely at fault in last summer's blackout, run on parallel currents. Told repeatedly what to do, both fail to take needed action.
First Energy could have prevented the Aug. 14 blackout simply by doing a better job trimming trees, training workers, upgrading computers, and communicating with neighboring utilities, according to the final report released recently by the U.S.-Canada task force investigating the blackout.
The North American Electric Reliability Council (NERC), had identified Ohio's systemic "vulnerability" earlier in the summer. But, as a voluntary organization, it had no authority to require preventive action. NERC relies on "reciprocity, peer pressure, and the mutual self-interest of all those involved" to keep the grid running smoothly.
In other words, the electrical grid is only as good as its worst actor. That became clear Aug. 14, when a short-circuit caused by a tree rubbing a 345,000-volt line turned into a cascading blackout. Fifty million people in eight states were left in the dark for up to four days, and the U.S. economy lost close to $10 billion.
Reliability standards
Clearly, a voluntary system is too risky. That's why NERC, among others, has been begging Congress for six years to set mandatory reliability standards, including enforcement powers. But, like First Energy, Congress doesn't accept suggestions.
Republican leaders are singularly focused on passing an omnibus energy bill, and they're holding electricity reliability -- something everyone supports -- hostage to do it. They've wasted 15 months wrangling over tax breaks for fossil fuels, ethanol subsidies for farmers, negotiating liability waivers for polluters, and trading pork-barrel projects for votes on drilling on environmentally sensitive land. The bill has grown unaffordable for even the White House.
The Senate wisely voted down the bill in November. Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., has been trying to introduce a scaled-down version ever since.
The blackout report demands Congress act: "The single most important step in the United States is for the U.S. Congress to enact the reliability provisions in pending energy bills."