Markets pride themselves in achieving efficiency, not equity. In a competitive electric market, these underserved communities may also be technologically dictated. For example, areas with distribution constraints or unusual climatic zones may prove unattractive to aggregators. The Commission will need to pay special attention to the intentional or inadvertent discrimination that is engendered by the competitive market. The deregulation of electric services raises a number of new privacy issues that had not developed in the tightly controlled regulated industry.
Most states strictly prohibit disclosure of utility customer information.
However, in a competitive market that relies free-flowing market information, the statutory controls are not applicable. In promoting dissemination of market information, the Post-Modern regulator must take care to ensure that customers are able to maintain control over their personal customer information. Most important will be the dilemma of secondary usage of customer information. The absence of controls over secondary usage will chill, rather than enhance, the growth of a competitive residential and small business market. Privacy is important for large industrial or commercial customers because competitors can estimate production levels of ultimate goods and may be able to determine production methods based on billing data.