PSC Order No. 7199

PSC Order No. 7199 runs to 33 pages, not including the staff report, and can be found online here. The opening pages are devoted to recounting the record. The good stuff starts with paragraph 52:

52. This process has made it abundantly clear that Delaware must, as Staff recommends, take control of its own energy future. As one of the commenters at the May 8, 2007 hearing pointed out, the Town of Long Beach, California emerged unscathed from the Enron debacle because it had its own generation. (5/8/07 Transcript at 1751). We believe it is imperative for new generation to be sited in Delaware to help maintain the reliability of the system and to provide power to DP&L’s SOS [Standard Offer Service] customers.
53. We realize that we cannot insulate ratepayers from all market forces in this era of deregulation, but we must do our utmost to ensure that we fulfill the mandate the General Assembly has given us: to supply DP&L’s Delaware SOS with reliable energy at reasonably stable rates, taking into consideration the criteria enumerated in the EURCSA [Electric Utility Retail Customer Supply Act of 2006]. Those criteria, as many of the commenters have observed, do not focus solely on price; rather, there are other public policy considerations that the General Assembly has identified as more important than price. Therefore, we cannot accept DP&L’s invitation to reject all of the bids because they exceed what DP&L has calculated to be a levelized 2005 market price.

The commission allows itself a bit of rhetorical flourish in paragraph 55:

55. With our vote here today we bring the potential for clean, renewable and carbon free wind power to Delaware, an important factor for consideration in EURCSA.

And on to the punchline:

Accordingly, we direct DP&L and Bluewater to negotiate in good faith for a long-term PPA for the provision of wind power. While we support Staff’s guidance on the 200-300 MW size, we will allow some, albeit not unlimited, flexibility in the size because we want to give DP&L and Bluewater the greatest flexibility in negotiating an agreement that will be the most beneficial for Delaware.

As for backup power:

56. We also direct DP&L to negotiate with both Conectiv and NRG to provide any backup firm power that may be necessary when wind power is not available, and that these negotiations be conducted independently, and in the same time frame that DP&L is negotiating with Bluewater.

The PSC set a timetable for negotiations:

We suggest conclusion of negotiations within a 30 to 60 day time frame maximum; however, to the extent that there is continuing progress we can accept some extension in that process.
57. In this regard, we direct DP&L to report back to the State Agencies at least weekly regarding the progress and status of the negotiations.