Utility Week articles from November 2003

Utility Week archives from November 2003

electricity; AES eyes wind assets in Spain.(wind power assets, AES Corp.)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... US energy group AES has joined other foreign energy companies eager to take a slice of Spain's booming electricity and wind power market. AES managing director for Spain Gerrit Nicholas said the US power giant was exploring 'good...

WATER; Security and price plea on rights trading.(consumer body WaterVoice, United Kingdom)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Consumer body WaterVoice has called on the Environment Agency to ensure customers do not end up paying the price of water rights trading. Responding to an agency consultation, WaterVoice said its overriding concern was that the development...

gas; Germany mulls new access regime.(BGW, water and gas utilities association)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... German Gas and water utilities association BGW has proposed a new access model for the country's gas network. It has proposed following the country's power sector and switching from point-to-point grid access to an entry-exit model. This...

The name of the game.(recruiting employees to the energy sector)
November 7, 2003... The energy sector's bad reputation is putting potential employees off . Leigh Anderson tells suppliers to act now. To say the UK energy industry has had a difficult two years would be something of an understatement. The aftershocks of the...

ELECTRICITY; Green groups see red over report.(Renewable Power Association, renewable energy report; United Kingdom)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... The Renewable Power Association (RPA) has blasted the Carbon Trust's conclusions on the options for UK renewable energy, saying some of them were obvious and others wrong. The RPA said the trust's conclusions that offshore wind had the...

Independents' day.(Consumer Council for Water, United Kingdom)
November 7, 2003... Changes are afoot in the arrangements for consumer representation in the utilities. A new Consumer Council for Water will be set up as a result of the Water Bill, and Ofcom is about to appoint a new Communications Consumer Panel. Together, the...

Workout routine.(utilities, call centers; customer services, United Kingdom)
November 7, 2003... Essential but unsexy, spending money on utilities seems a rather boring way of parting with your hard-earned cash. Unfortunately for the marketing departments, there's no such thing as cool gas, or the best-looking electricity. Neither, it...

TELECOMS; New directory enquiries give poor level of service.(contacting utility companies, United Kingdom)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... A recent survey has added to mounting evidence that the new 118 directory enquiries services are performing poorly. The Consumers' Association looked at 16 directory enquiries services and found that three-quarters of them were unable to...

eNERGY; Watchdog pans debt-block plan.(energy suppliers, United Kingdom)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... The decision by domestic energy suppliers to bring in permanent measures to end the practice of debt-blocking for some customers has had a mixed response from watchdogs. Ofgem has welcomed the move, which means that from next April energy...

ENERGY; Hunt is on to find emissions traders.(Environment Agency, Europe)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... The Environment Agency (EA) has begun contacting companies due to be covered by the European Union's emissions trading scheme and which will need permits from the agency so they can take part in the new arrangements. However, the EA has...

water; EIB loans Lyon e50m for water infrastructure.(European Investment Bank ; Lyon, France)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... The European Investment Bank (EIB) has drawn up plans to lend the city of Lyon, France, e50 million to modernise its drinking water supply and wastewater disposal systems. Lyon's plans include the renewal of its 3,600km of drinking water...

electricity; Enel and EDF market access talks continue.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Enel chief executive Paolo Scaroni and EDF chairman Francois Roussely have held further talks on improving access to each other's national power markets. The latest meeting agreed the timetable to finalise a deal, in which Enel would...

energy; Minimum tax rate set for gas and electricity.
November 7, 2003... by Keith Nuthall European utilities have voiced their alarm and concern about a decision last week by the European Union to extend a system of minimum tax rates for mineral oils to all energy products, including electricity and natural...

GAS; United sells gas network to East Surrey Water.(United Utilities)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... East Surrey Holdings, owner of Sutton and East Surrey Water, has bought two local gas network businesses from United Utilities for [pounds sterling]3.1 million. Multi-utility United said that owning gas networks was not seen as a core part...

Sold in.(privatization in new EU members will transform energy market)
November 7, 2003... Next year the European energy scene will be transformed when ten new countries and 75 million citizens join the European Union. Among the ten new members are a clutch of central and eastern European nations with sizeable energy sectors, namely...

WATER; MPs berate industry for price rise 'racket'.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... by Karma Ockenden MPs last week blasted the water industry for putting shareholders before customers by seeking price increases of up to one-third in the 2005-10 price review period. Austin Mitchell, on the Environment, Food and Rural...

ENERGY; Postal strikes boost email payment deals.(British Gas)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Applicants for British Gas's domestic email billing service jumped 50 per cent during last week's postal strikes, the company said, bringing the total number of households signed up to about 100,000. The strikes were halted after agreement...

electricity; Endesa puts e360m into Canary plants.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Spain's biggest power utility, Endesa, is investing e360 million in combined-cycle power stations in Tenerife and Gran Canaria, part of the Canary Islands archipelago. The company said it had already fired up one of the three turbines that...

Power's panacea.(Energy Bill)
November 7, 2003... Will the forthcoming Energy Bill prove a cure-all for the industry? . Roger Barnard finds plenty of evidence to be hopeful. Those mysterious people known as 'government sources' have been talking up the likelihood of an Energy Bill being...

energy; Customer problems with switching start to wane.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Complaints about erroneous transfers by energy suppliers have fallen dramatically over the past year, while the overall number of mistakes made by companies has dropped by more than a half, latest figures compiled by energy regulator Ofgem have...

Prime Ministers and questions.
November 7, 2003... The great man has been sent some intriguing correspondence involving the Prime Minister, which readers may find of passing interest. A couple of weeks back, Leominster MP Bill Wiggin asked the Prime Minister about promised regulations for...

ELECTRICITY; Watchdog orders safety probe into French PWRs.(pressurised water reactors)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Electricite de France has been ordered to investigate a potential fault in the country's ageing fleet of nuclear power stations. The call has come from the French government's nuclear safety authority, ASN. It is concerned about a possible...

Electricity; Gamesa net profits set to soar 47%.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Spanish wind and aeronautics group Gamesa is on course to make a net profit of e200 million this year, up 47 per cent on 2002, helped by a strong performance from its wind business. Talking to analysts in Madrid, Gamesa said the profit hike...

energy; Natural strikes Puerto Rico assets deal.(Gas Natural to buy Enron's holdings in EcoElectrica)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Gas Natural has struck a deal to buy the shareholding of bankrupt US energy company Enron in Puerto Rican power company EcoElectrica for e155 million. Spain's biggest gas company said it agreed to buy the 47.5 per cent stake in the company...

ENERGY; Contract prices catch a rising tide.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... As Energy futures continued to soar last week, energy market analyst John Hall Associates reported October contract wholesale prices surging more than 25 per cent over the April round. Natural gas futures added 30 per cent in 12 days and...

electricity; Danes and Germans in offshore wind first.(Energi E2, Plambeck Neue Energien to build wind park in North Sea)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... by Gerard O'Dwyer Denmark's Energi E2 and Germany's Plambeck Neue Energien have teamed up to build the first German offshore wind park in the North Sea. The two companies have entered into a preliminary contract to co-finance the project....

ELECTRICITY; British Energy creaks as cracks open new wounds.(shutdowns at Heysham, Sizewell B reactors)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... British Energy said unplanned shutdowns at its Heysham and Sizewell B reactors will cost up to [pounds sterling]30 million. It warned investors that volatile prices meant it would have to pay more to source alternative power to meet its...

WATER; Ofwat approves price rises for two firms.(Northumbrian Water, United Utilities)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... by Roger Milne Two water and sewerage companies breathed a sigh of relief this week as regulator Ofwat approved their request to be allowed to increase customer bills ahead of the next price control. Ofwat's announcement on Wednesday...

electricity; Italgen plans 4GW of plant.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Italgen, the power generation subsidiary of Italian industrial group Italcementi, is to invest e2 billion in more than 4GW of new capacity in Italy. The company plans to build four new gas-fired power stations and convert two others into...

Reputation matters.(expectations for utilities)
November 7, 2003... A utility's reputation has always been important - but never to the degree that it is now. When utilities were monopolies, expectations of what they did or could do were far lower, and in case there was nowhere else for customers to go. ...

pan-utility; Transco roadworks appeal allowed.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Laws aimed at penalising utility companies when they cause road chaos by dragging out roadworks were this week branded by one of the country's senior judges as being like the 'product of a demented computer'. In a case with multi-million...

ELECTRICITY; MPs urge more clarity over atom liabilities.(Nuclear Decommissioning Authority)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Parliament has told ministers to clarify the initial level of contributions for the proposed new Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) and the annual level of financial support it will need. MPs said last week that this was essential...

Water controls make waves.(briefs)
November 7, 2003... Water regulator Ofwat has not yet drawn any firm conclusions on the appropriate cost of capital for water companies for 2005-10 - the lifetime of the next price control - but it has signalled there is no strong case for setting it at a lower...

ENERGY ; Charity call for [pounds sterling]4bn to curb winter deaths.(National Energy Action)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... National Energy Action (NEA), the leading fuel poverty charity, has urged ministers to find an extra [pounds sterling]4 billion between now and 2010 to cut winter deaths. The call came as official statistics from the Office for National...

Telewest.(Company Profile)
November 7, 2003... by Trevor Dooley The UK's second-largest cable company, Telewest, can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel with regards to its [pounds sterling]3.5 billion debt-for-equity swap. But the illumination may have been dimmed lately...

Swisscom.(Company Profile)
November 7, 2003... by Nigel Hawkins Swisscom dates back to 1852 when the first public telegraph service between St Gallen and Zurich was built. Nowadays, the company remains the dominant telecoms player in Switzerland, both for fixed-line and mobile...

TELECOMS; Broadband lifts NTL but churn increases.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Customer disconnections leapt 14 per cent at cable operator NTL in the third quarter of 2003. But broadband uptake boosted revenues to cut losses by two-thirds year on year to [pounds sterling]117.3 million. NTL added 56,200 customers after...

electricity; Green power network problems left hanging.(challenges of distributed generation from windfarms)
November 7, 2003... by Roger Milne Electricity network companies last week called for more dialogue with the wind energy industry as both sides faced up to the technical, commercial and regulatory challenges of distributed generation. The call came from...

electricity; Finland pushes Nordic grid.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Finland has decided to take a lead in pursuing the establishment of a common Nordic transmission system operator that would involve merging operators in Finland, Denmark, Sweden and Norway. Finland's Ministry of Trade & Industry plans to...

energy; Norway stops short of diktat on reservoirs.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Norway's Department of Energy has presented a revised legislative proposal that stops short of placing special requirements on utilities to maintain hydro reservoirs at certain levels. The Norwegian government promised new laws to regulate...

telecoms; Dutch benefiting most from telecoms.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... An organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) report has said that out of all the European Union countries the Netherlands has benefited most economically from investing in telecoms and information technology. Much of...

TELECOMS; Hostilities escalate as Orange aims at web.
November 7, 2003... by Martha Grace The battlefield that is the UK mobile telecoms market reverberated to another round of fire as France Telecom's Orange unveiled plans to attack Vodafone's position in the picture messaging market. Orange said it would...

Power prospects centre stage.
November 7, 2003... Energy minister Stephen Timms has continued to be quietly optimistic that there won't be serious power supply problems this winter. 'I don't believe, on the basis of the information that I've seen, that we are heading for a problem this...

water; EBRD grants further loan to Romania.(European Bank for Reconstruction and Development lends to Regia Autonoma Aquaserv)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is lending Romanian water utility Regia Autonoma Aquaserv e7 million to improve drinking water supplies in the central Romania town of Targu Mures. The loan complements a e20.9...

ELECTRICITY; ScottishPower profits up but no new build.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... ScottishPower recorded an operating profit of [pounds sterling]452 million for the half year on turnover of [pounds sterling]2,525 million, up from the previous year's profit of [pounds sterling]380 million on [pounds sterling]2,447 million...

electricity; Norway keeps tight rein on outages.(Statnett regime for power plant outage regulation)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Norwegian state transmission system operator Statnett has presented a new and more rigid regime to regulate power plant outages in Norway during the winter months to 1 March 2004. The new measures place greater reporting controls on...

telecoms; Fees ruling will hand Telecom Italia e2bn.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... by Simon Jones A European Court of Justice ruling looks set to hand Telecom Italia a e2 billion windfall. The European Union's (EU's) highest court ruled last month that licence fees levied by the Italian government on telecoms companies...

TELECOMS; Thus dismisses WiFi prospects.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Alternative telecoms operator Thus has dismissed the prospects for the heavily touted 'WiFi' mobile broadband technology, saying it was 'inherently flawed'. Thus's head of product futures, Steve Kennedy, questioned WiFi's ability to...

electricity; Report blames Swiss for Italian blackout.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... by Keith Nuthall A fierce row over who was to blame for the power failure that pitched Italy into darkness on 28 September has broken out between the Italian, Swiss and French governments. The blackout, the worst in Italy's history, left...

ELECTRICITY; Wind pioneer ponders bond to fund growth.(Ecotricity)(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... Independent wind generator Ecotricity has revealed plans for a bond issue - its first - which will probably happen in the first quarter of 2004. Dale Vince, chief executive of the green energy producer, signalled the move in an interview with...

WATER; Water summit in London and Brussels.(Brief Article)
November 7, 2003... An unprecedented double summit bringing together all of Europe's water industry was staged in two European capitals this week. Organised by Water UK, with a workshop element co-ordinated by European water body Eureau, the event, Source,...

WATER; Half the industry falls short on security.
November 7, 2003... by Karma Ockenden Eleven water companies have failed to meet their targets on security of supply, Ofwat has reported. According to its latest security of supply index, three companies have large deficits on their targets, three have...

Turbine talk.(Ecotricity CEO Dale Vince)(Interview)
November 7, 2003... Dale Vince, chief executive of leading independent wind generator Ecotricity never thought it was going to be easy, but he is still a tad surprised at some of the reaction to his company's schemes. 'We get some very extreme letters. It's as...

TELECOMS; Czech minnow slashes losses as sales grow.(Aliatel, 2003 January-September period)(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... Losses at alternative Czech telecoms company Aliatel shrank 22 per cent while sales increased 41 per cent for the January-September period. The company, 60 per cent owned by local power distributors and 40 per cent owned by German utility...

WATER; AWG Czechs out for e27m.(Anglian Water Group, sells water assets in Czech Republic)(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... Anglian Water Group (AWG) last week sold its Czech water assets to Czech-Slovak group Penta Finance and Austrian utility Energie. Penta will pay e27 million for 54.3 per cent of AWG's shares in Severomoravske Vodovody a Kanalizace (SMVaK),...

ENVIRONMENT; Citizens to get watchdog powers.(European Union citizens )(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... European law is set to guarantee the rights of European Union citizens to access environmental information, participate in environmental decision-making and grant them the right to bring public authorities to court over this policy area, if EU...

GAS; LNGsales rocket to buoy BGGroup.(BG Group, 2003 third quarter earnings; liquefied natural gas )(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... An increase of over 400 per cent in BG Group's liquefied natural gas (LNG) revenues helped buoy the integrated gas and oil company's third-quarter earnings, it emerged last week. Over the three months to 30 September, the group's turnover...

TELECOMS; Oftel bans BT win-back calls.(British Telecom, United Kingdom; government agency)(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... BT has locked antlers with telecoms regulator Oftel after the watchdog banned the operator from using its obligation to inform departing customers of their change to a new operator as an opportunity to dissuade them from switching. The...

Old coal plant could linger longest.(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... Conventional gas-fired power plants have only about 30 years before they give way to new technology, according to Nebojasa Nakicenovic of the Vienna University of Technology. Speaking at the Royal Institute of International Affairs climate...

TELECOMS; Growth call for broadband.(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... A key OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) committee has called on governments to promote competition within the emerging broadband and wireless sectors. The OECD committee on information, computer and...

ENVIRONMENT; EBRD backs Dutch green credit plan.(European Bank for Reconstruction and Development)(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... The Netherlands has secured the help of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions targets by investing in eastern European projects that aim to cut pollution. The bank and the Dutch...

ELECTRICITY; CEZ growth strategy stays as Mil departs.(Jaroslav Mil)
November 14, 2003... by Mark Andress CEZ's strategy of becoming a regional electricity giant through cross-border acquisitions in Slovakia and further afield in the Balkans is not under threat, despite the sacking of its architect late last month, the Czech...

PAN-UTILITY; Russell scores high on chief value.(ScottishPower chief executive Ian Russell)(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... ScottishPower chief executive Ian Russell ranked sixth in an assessment by Citigate Dewe Rogerson of FTSE-100 chief executive officer 'brand value', and came first in the electricity sector. Citigate said it assessed the value of chief...

ELECTRICITY; Wind power to take on gas and coal soon.(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... by Deirdre Mason Danish experts last week forecast that wind power would become competitive with conventional gas and coal power plants in seven to ten years. This was view of Denmark's Risoe National Laboratory expressed at a Royal...

environment; EU backs pollution-cutting strategies.(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... European Union ministers have welcomed the European Commission's plan to develop the EU's first environment and health strategy, which would include backing pollution-cutting policies. Ministers have called for the development of research...

TELECOMS; Consolidation moves rumble in directories.(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... by Stephanie Joanna Consolidation moves started in the new directory enquiries market this week, with one of the leading players seeking talks with a rival operator. Conduit (11 88 88) is understood to have approached market leader...

TELECOMS; Regulator too soft on Deutsche Telekom.
November 14, 2003... by Simon Jones German telecoms association VATM has demanded regulator RegTP take a more aggressive stance towards Deutsche Telekom. A VATM-commissioned survey by business consultancy Dialog Consult found that the industry was growing...

WATER; Customers and funding threat to water future.(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... Customers' readiness to pay for quality improvements could not be taken for granted when those standards were already at record levels, warned a report for Water UK by consultant Ernst & Young. Efficiency gains after the next price review...

ENERGY; EDFEnergy staff get new final salary pension.(French electric power firm)(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... French owned EDFEnergy has unveiled a new final salary pension scheme for its 11,000 employees, currently divided between five different schemes. Chief executive Vincent de Rivaz said he expected the offer - which will shift a greater...

ELECTRICITY; Enel mulls over Bulgarian wires move.(share in electricity distribution group, Bulgaria)(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... Italian energy giant Enel is considering taking a controlling stake in a group of state-owned Bulgarian electricity distributors earmarked for part-privatisation. The move was seen as part of Enel's strategy to counteract its shrinking...

ELECTRICITY; Endesa forms Italian joint venture.(ASM Brescia, forms Ergon Energia)(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... Spain's biggest power group, Endesa, and Italian energy company ASM Brescia have formed Ergon Energia, a joint venture that will sell gas and electricity in Italy's liberalised power market. Endesa Italia chief executive Jesus Olmos and his...

eLECTRICITY; Users call for curb on grid access fees.(Germany, electricity grids)(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... A report by large-scale energy users' lobby Verband der Industriellen Energie-und Kraftwirtschaft (VIK) has suggested that 116 German grid operators charge excessive access fees. The survey revealed that 18 of 48 companies with high-voltage...

MULTI-UTILITY; RWE gets OK to bag four town utilities.(RWE AG, acquisitions; Germany)(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... The Federal Cartel Office (FCO) has approved, with divestment conditions, RWE's purchase - via RWE Rhein-Ruhr - of stakes in four municipal energy utilities in North Rhine-Westphalia. The authority is forcing RWE to sell its 40 per cent...

Squirrel's shock to the system.
November 14, 2003... Disconnector will be watching. And waiting. Will Sir John Mogg, chairman of Ofgem, follow the lead of one of his non-executive directors, James Strachan? Strachan is probably better known as the head honcho at the Audit Commission. There,...

Price slice.(water price review)
November 14, 2003... With 12 months to go before I set price limits for 2005-10 there is understandably a great deal of interest in the likely outcomes. I set out at the beginning of this process to conduct an open and transparent review. The focus has been to...

GAS; RWE makes fresh bid for gas stake.(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... RWE has made a fresh offer for the 20.3 per cent stake in RWE Gas held by 46 municipal shareholders. The municipal block has so far prevented chairman Harry Roels from including the group's gas arm in new unit RWE Energy. Neither side has...

gas; Ofgem 'monitoring' gas price rises.(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... Despite being 'concerned about the increase in gas prices', energy regulator Ofgem is currently only 'monitoring the situation as part of its responsibilities'. A spokesman for the watchdog said it 'had not yet actively sought people's...

GAS; Gazprom lifts restrictions on exports to EU.(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... European Union energy suppliers importing Russian gas have had restrictions on who they can sell to lifted, the country's gas giant Gazprom has confirmed. Gazprom has for some time been under pressure from the European Commission to ditch...

electricity; Germany thrashes out green subsidy.(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... Germany's environment minister, Jurgen Trittin, and economics minister Wolfgang Clement have settled their dispute over reforms to the controversial renewable energy law, dubbed EEG. A compromise between the two ministries secured the 20...

WATER; United and Southern too green for Agency.(Environment Agency criticizes United Utilities, Southern Water)
November 14, 2003... by Karma Ockenden Green watchdog the Environment Agency last week criticised two water companies for over-egging their projected green spend in 2005-10, and was itself taken to task by MPs for the quality of its price review data. ...

ELECTRICITY; IP falls after profit warning.(International Power share price falls)(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... Shares in International Power fell 20 per cent briefly, after the company said it expected lower profits in 2004. It predicted earnings of 7-9p a share for 2004, compared to 9-11p in 2003. The shares slumped on the news but rallied later....

electricity; EU to set security of supply targets.(Brief Article)
November 14, 2003... European Union energy commissioner Loyola de Palacio has unveiled details of an upcoming policy paper addressing the security of Europe's energy supplies. She said recent blackouts meant it was time for all utilities to reassess current plans...

Briefing counters.(financial presentations)
November 14, 2003... The financial climate is still extremely volatile with the FTSE 100 only just recovering after a three-year losing streak. Corporate scandals such as those at Enron, Marconi and WorldCom have tarnished the reputations of management. Confidence...

Italian disunification.
November 14, 2003... Four-and-a half-years ago, the February 1999 Bersani Decree introduced limited competition in Italian electricity supply. Eligibility was initially limited to customers with an annual consumption of over 30GWh, but the threshold has since been...