2001 - Energy

Energy

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) reimposes regulation on California utilities June 19 after electricity rates have spiked in much of the state under deregulation.

Houston-based Enron Corp. chairman Kenneth L. Lay sells stock in the company every day through July to repay loans he has received from Enron (see commerce, 1997). CEO Jeff Skilling, 46, resigns August 14 "for personal reasons" as the company's Broadband division reports losses of $137 million and Lay takes over as CEO. Originally a natural-gas pipeline company, Enron has become an on-line power trader, reshaping the way natural gas and electricity are bought and sold, and a trader in many other things; it reveals August 16 that it has taken a $1.6 billion hit to shareholder equity related to its partnerships; on November 8 it files a disclosure document with the Securities and Exchange Commission acknowledging that it overstated its net income by 20 percent beginning in 1997 and has massive off-balance-sheet liabilities. Enron's stock plummets; its employees' 401k plans are left with virtually nothing and many have no other retirement savings (see 2002).

France establishes the government-owned Groupe Areva to control the nation's nuclear reactors and handle recycling of nuclear waste. Created by a merger of Cogema S.A., Framatome ANP, and some other entities, Areva's electronics division is the world's third largest player in telecommunication connectors but three-fourths of its revenue comes from nuclear energy, and it will soon be the world's largest nuclear-energy company, with 50,000 employees worldwide and a mission to promote nuclear power as the only way to increase energy production without damaging the environment.