Portland energy firm to challenge steep FERC fines
The Portland-based Competitive Energy Services and its owner plan to contest millions in fines from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which says the company manipulated energy markets.
The Portland Press Herald reported FERC issued a final order assessing $7.5 million in fines to the company and $1.25 million in fines to its owner, Richard Silkman. The order will allow the agency to go to federal court to enforce the fines, first ordered in July 2012, after a 60-day period.
Dustin Brooks, a representative for Competitive Energy Services, told the paper that it plans to fight the allegations and fines in federal court sometime next year. Brooks told the paper the company has not had a chance to review FERC’s evidence or witness testimony in the case.
The federal commission alleges that Silkman and his company advised Rumford Paper Co. to reduce its internal power generation and buy electricity over five days in order to set an “artificially high” baseline for its needs for power from the grid. That, in turn, the commission alleges, allowed the company to benefit when the region’s electric grid operator called upon the paper mill to reduce its power consumption.
Brooks said the company maintains it complied with FERC’s rules and regulations for that program and intends to show in court that other New England companies used the program in the same way.
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