Yes. It's a tremendously important part of the life of any electric
utility. It was a tremendously important part of Carolina Power and
Light's life, long before I was involved in it, when I was involved in
it, and even today. The electric utility industry is probably the most
highly regulated industry in the country. If you start at the federal
level, you have the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, formerly the
Federal Power Commission. You have the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for
all companies operating nuclear plants. You have the Environmental
Protection Agency. You have the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Occasionally, you might have the Federal Trade Commission involved.
Occasionally, you might have something that would go before the
Page 10Justice Department. Occasionally, you might have
ICC [Interstate Commerce Commission], which is now the Federal
Transportation Board. You have all of those regulators, plus the United
States' Congress—which is very interested, as they should be, in
ensuring there's an adequate supply of reasonably priced energy,
particularly electricity, in the country. The state level you have, of
course, a governor and the Department of Commerce [both] very interested
in the economic growth and development. You have a State Utilities
Commission that regulates the rates and services of not only electric
companies, but gas companies, telephone companies. At one time they had
jurisdiction over transportation, but that's either disappeared or moved
to the federal level for the most part. In addition, you have state
environmental agencies. The names of those agencies have evolved over
time. Generally speaking, they're agencies that are responsible for land
use, air quality, and water quality in the state. I haven't mentioned
the state Department of Labor, the Federal Department of Labor, and the
Occupational Safety and Health Act, and those things, because they apply
to all businesses. They also impact utilities because utilities are very
visible. Often we feel the impact or the affect of federal regulation
first, before some other businesses feel that. How does one manage that?
Of course the first thing you have to do—and I'll simplify this, and
then be glad to go into more detail—[is] you have to make sure that the
business that you run, runs very well. Just assume that you weren't
regulated at all. If you had the ability to say, "This company is going
to be run with the highest possible degree of excellence, just because
that's a good thing. That's the way it should be. It makes the company
more profitable, a better citizen." You have to focus on your
operations. Then if you do a good—. When I say, "you," I'm not talking
about myself or any other
Page 11individual. If the
company does that well, then your position vis a vis the regulators is,
One: you understand what their legal authority and responsibilities are.
You have written reports and you have formal hearings. But, there's an
interaction that takes place because you're constantly subject to
inspection. Something will happen. Even though it may not be a happening
that requires a formal legal notification—just in the sense of good
communications—the regulators are informed. They know when something is
publicly announced, that it is going to be announced because they'll be
asked questions by the consumer or other people in government, "What
does this mean that X utility is doing such and such?" You have to have
a system so that it's open, it's communicative, and it's informative.
Yet, the regulators aren't the managers of the company. You have to have
an appropriate distance there. You keep them informed. There may be
things that they'd like you to do, that you don't feel you should do.
There may be things that you feel you must do, that the regulators—some
of them, for whatever reason—feel you shouldn't do. You have to be
prepared to stand your ground based on the facts and the overall best
interests of the company and the consumer you serve. In the electric
utility industry, and not yet fully in telephones or gas [industries],
you don't have the type of competition that you have in many other
businesses. The regulators are deemed to be a surrogate for that type of
competition. That is, they have the responsibility to the public. I'm
talking about the Utilities Commission and the Federal Energy Regulatory
Commission, principally, that regulate the price and regulate the types
of service and the quality of service that you provide. It's their
responsibility to be a substitute for competition. That system was put
in place in order to prevent unnecessary economic waste and
duplication—which apparently, at one time, we had at some places in this
country. You have to respect their
Page 12authority. You
have to be prepared to justify fully whatever action you have been
taking or propose to take whatever steps they may wish you to do, that
you don't feel you should. You have to manage the business, realizing
that they have a very special and unique role and have open
communications. Yet, you have to assume the responsibility for managing
the business as you think best. Many times that leads to disagreements.
The ways for disagreements to be resolved, realizing that the
legislature and the Utilities Commission have the last say so—. I mean,
the regulation of business—particularly public service—is a legislative
function. You have to be attuned to the fact that your customers expect
certain things, and that they have access to the regulators. The
regulators hear from the public. You want the customers to have every
reason, when they do express their opinions to the regulators, to be
able to say, "Yes, I receive good quality of service." In our business,
the quality of service is the most important thing. It's more important
than price, although price is tremendously important. Someone else once
said, in sort of a national debate on electricity many years ago, "The
most expensive electricity you can have is no electricity." It's not my
phrase, but it says a lot in a few words. How do you manage that? Well,
[you have] good customer service. You operate the business well. You
have employees in various places in your company that have the
responsibilities for interfacing with regulators. They have to be
well-trained and authorized to make sure they perform their jobs, so
that the regulators are kept informed of what you're doing and why
you're doing it. Then, just as it's important to have well qualified
people elected as president of United States, or governor or to the
legislature, it's important that you have well-qualified people elected
to the Public Service Commission or the Federal Energy Regulator
Commission or the Nuclear Regulatory
Page 13Commission.
The utilities obviously don't have control over who's appointed to those
bodies, but if they let it be known, not which individuals that they
think would be good, but the qualifications that one needs to be a good
regulator—. There are certain qualifications, for example, on the
Utilities Commission that could be very helpful in different degrees:
some background in accounting, finance, even general business and
engineering. With the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, an even more
detailed technical and scientific background can be helpful. Just like
in the Final Four basketball game, you hope you've got good, fair,
reasonable, objective referees. You don't have referees that come into
the game and say, "Hey, I really think it's time for team A to be
watched a little more closely than Team B on technical fouls or
traveling or something."