While I tend to agree with you here, it should be noted that Enron did break the law in “gaming the system” (as it’s called) during the CA energy crisis several years ago, even if it was an opportunity that should never have been presented them in the first place if the dergulation process hadn’t been designed so poorly. There’s lots of blame to go around-- and, oddly enough, Gray Davis is gone and so is Enron.
Enron was a participant and was found to have engaged in some illegal practices during the California Energy crisi. But they were one of dozens and actually not the biggest. And even though that activity was illegal and damaging, there were man yother factors involved, such as the lack of new generation, dry winters, natural gas price craziness, etc.
As for building new power plants, while the nevironmental red tape was a deterrent, the biggest deterrent during the deregulation period was the fact that the major utilities could not enter into long term contracts for power. They were forced to buy on the day ahead spot market. Who is going to invest hundreds of miullions of dollars into a power plant with such uncertainty?
