Antitrust

California Energy Market

View Previously Secret Evidence Supporting California's Refund Claims

Listen For Yourself

"Enron Tapes"

These recordings provide powerful evidence of the market misconduct that inflicted so much harm on California businesses and consumers in the early 2000s. Hear for yourself how Enron traders and their partners bragged and laughed about stealing money from "Grandma Millie" and California. (Note: These excerpts are uncensored and may contain vulgar language, such as exchanges in "Grandma Millie," "Needing Blackouts" and "Reliant Making A Killing.")

Hear More Enron Exchanges

"100-Day Tapes"

In March 2003, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ("FERC") was presented with transcripts of conversations involving traders for major energy companies showing that power generators and sellers broke FERC rules and the law during the California energy crisis. Here are some of the audio excerpts.

Resources

During the 2000-01 California energy crisis, the electricity market in the Golden State suffered a meltdown. Rolling blackouts plunged businesses and residents into darkness, while power companies harmed their own customers. Responding to the crisis, the Attorney General established the Attorney General’s Energy Task Force to investigate and to seek remedies for the harm caused by market manipulation and other unlawful conduct.

Taking action against power generators and traders for unfair business practices, commodities fraud, and antitrust violations, the task force filed dozens of lawsuits and worked to undo price-gouging long-term contracts that California had signed under duress in the midst of the crisis.

Getting our money back Getting Our Money Back The task force further pressed the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (“FERC”) for billions of dollars in refunds from energy companies that charged unjust, unreasonable rates. Despite legal roadblocks and hurdles thrown up by FERC, the Attorney General recovered more than $3.3 billion from power companies, including more than $2.5 billion in consumer benefits. [See chart: Getting Our Money Back.]

In 1999, the first full year of deregulation, California expenditures on wholesale electricity had totaled $7.4 billion. Just one year later, those costs rose 277 percent, to $27.1 billion. In 2001, wholesale prices remained at the exorbitantly high level of $26.7 billion.

The illicit tools energy traders used in their schemes to jack up prices were market-gaming devices bearing such provocative names as Fat Boy, Death Star, Get Shorty, and Ricochet. The evidence shows that electricity generators lied to power grid operators and withheld electricity to further increase prices. In audio tapes, Enron even bragged about stealing money from “Grandma Millie” in California.

When California’s investor-owned utilities could no longer afford to pay sky-high wholesale prices, the state stepped in to make sure the lights stayed on. Energy companies then proceeded to hold up the state, both in the day-to-day market and in long-term contracts that sought to guarantee hefty profits.

Unfettered by FERC, power generators and traders overcharged California ratepayers by some $9 billion. Some experts put the total damage to California’s economy at more than $40 billion. PG&E went bankrupt, and Southern California Edison came close.

Cover and link to Report of Energy White Paper The Attorney General examined the breakdown in the state’s deregulated energy market from a law enforcement perspective. The review yielded the Attorney General's Energy White Paper: A Law Enforcement Perspective On The California Energy Crisis PDF logo [PDF 1.01 mb / 85 pg] that called for major reforms of the legal and regulatory framework that governs California’s wholesale electricity market. The findings conclude that the oversight and enforcement system failed during the energy crisis, worsened the effects of the crisis, and has undermined the ability of ratepayers to obtain redress for price gouging.