PREMIER ECONOMICS ADVISING

Impact

National Association of Business Economists

2025 Annual Meeting

October 12-14, 2025

Philadelphia, PA

THE CFA CONFERENCE IN MADISON

Excellent macroeconomic and macro financial data was provided by JP Morgan Asset Management. They did an excellent job of just laying out the data, all the data. They have a balanced view going forward with perhaps a 35% probability of recession. Check out their website for all the details and plenty of information all for free. Nice touch. Check this link to their Guide to the Markets.

https://am.jpmorgan.com/us/en/asset-management/adv/insights/market-insights/guide-to-the-markets/

GREAT CONFERENCE

ALL ABOUT DATA CENTERS

MADISON WI

ECONWERKS SUPPORTS COMPETITION AGAIN IN CONSTRUCTION OF NEW TRANSMISSION

Econwerks LLC played a small part advising the Wisconsin Industrial Energy Group WIEG during recent discussions of potential legislation on March 4, 2025 that would grant incumbent electric transmission companies a Right of First Refusal ROFR for the construction of new multi-value transmission lines in the state. A state ROFR law essentially estops other competitive developers from constructing a new multi-value transmission line, essentially granting the incumbent transmission company a monopoly on such lines’ construction.

The facts and arguments on each side of the equation were quite strong. Econwerks LLC sided with the WIEG for the main reason that competitive developers have been offering financing packages nearly 20-25% cheaper in overall present value cost and terms than incumbent electric transmission companies during competitive RFPs recently conducted by the regional grid operator, MISO, or Midcontinent Independent System Operator. Presently, incumbent transmission providers have been financing their projects using a WACC weighted average cost of capital of 7.0 to 7.5 percent; whereas, competitive developers have been offering finance packages using 5.0 to 6.5 percent. This difference represents a huge savings for residential, commercial and industrial customers.

Send any inquires to Randal@Econwerks.com

FROM COIN COLLECTING KID TO ECONOMIST

FEBRUARY 28, 11AM

This was a great event, and the specific session hosted by Econwerks LLC concerned the nexus of coin collecting and how it related to historical monetary events.

ELECTRICITY BILLS FOR DATA CENTERS IN WISCONSIN--Educatonal Webinar

ECONWERKS LLC participated in an educational webinar for Wisconsin economic development officials exploring the nascent issue of data development in the state. The ECONWERKS discussion centered on the hypothtical bill for a 100 MW data center located in WEPCO service territory taking service under its PSCW filed CP1 Tariff. The estimated bill impact was found to be $80+ million annually in electricity charges under current tariffs. See webinar for more details or please contact the company.

NATURAL MONOPOLY REGULATON TRAINING

November 21, 2024 via NASUCA Zoom Webinar.

This training by ECONWERKS LLC presented a one-hour session on the proper regulation of natural monopolies, focusing on the electric industry. The session was a visually-oriented practical lesson on the original reasons for government regulation of the electric industry and others with natural monopoly characteristics. The session was geared for folks with some technical background, but not required. This interactive presentation focused not on the math rather on the core regulation concepts in visual detail. This zoom-session training concluded by comparing how regulation is performed presently and how it departs or aligns with what economics specifies. The session also featured a game round of Regulationopoly, an ECONWERKS LLC creation, in which winners received a Tesla X, the Matchbox Version. Generous and comprehensive handouts are available under Resources tab on the NASUCA website.

For a Copy of the Presentation please see the NASUCA web site under its Resources tab, or email Econwerks directly.

NATURAL MONOPOLY REGULATON TRAINING

At this Conference ECONWERKS LLC presented a one-hour session on the proper regulation of natural monopolies, focusing on the electric industry. The session was a visually-oriented practical lesson on the original reasons for government regulation of the electric industry and others with natural monopoly characteristics. The session was geared for folks with some technical background, but the presentation focused not on the math rather on the core concepts in visual detail. This in-person training concluded by comparing how regulation is performed presently and how it departs or aligns with what economics specifies.

ECONWERKS SUPPORTS FINANCE COMPETITION IN THE CONSTRUCTION OF NEW TRANSMISSION

Econwerks LLC played a small part advising the Wisconsin Industrial Energy Group WIEG during recent discussions of potential legislation that would have granted incumbent electric transmission companies a Right of First Refusal ROFR for the construction of new multi-value transmission lines in the state. A state ROFR law essentially estops other competitive developers from constructing a new multi-value transmission line, essentially granting the incumbent transmission company a monopoly on such lines’ construction.

The facts and arguments on each side of the equation were quite strong. Econwerks LLC sided with the WIEG for the main reason that competitive developers have been offering financing packages nearly 20-25% cheaper in overall present value cost and terms than incumbent electric transmission companies during competitive RFPs recently conducted by the regional grid operator, MISO, or Midcontinent Independent System Operator. Presently, incumbent transmission providers have been financing their projects using a WACC weighted average cost of capital of 7.0 to 7.5 percent; whereas, competitive developers have been offering finance packages using 5.3 to 5.9 percent. This difference represents a huge savings for residential, commercial and industrial customers.

Send any inquires to Randal@Econwerks.com

October 2023 - March 2024

CRITIQUE OF DOE DRAFT TRANSMISSION NEEDS STUDY.pdf

ECONWERKS CRITIQUE CITED 20 TIMES BY DEPT. OF ENERGY

The US Department of Energy just released its final report on transmission needs from its Grid Deployment Office. Econwerks LLC provided numerous substantive comments on the initial draft; and, in the final version those comments received quite a few mentions. The theme of the Econwerks LLC comments was to do the study correctly, following strict scientific methods along with peer reviewed scrutiny and not just roll up the reports from all the various utilities and regional transmission operators, as they are too imbued with self interest irrespective of the utilized stakeholder processes.

The full critique is available below.

Send any inquires to Randal@Econwerks.com

October-November 2023

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