Congress, responding to concerns about U.S. dependence on foreign oil and environmental damage resulting from burning fossil fuels (oil, gas and coal) to produce electricity, passed the Public Utilities Regulatory Policies Act (PURPA) in 1978. The act encouraged the creation of power plants using renewable or nontraditional fuels such as geothermal, solar, and wind power and authorized FERC to regulate them. As long as these nonutility generators (known as “qualifying facilities,” or QFs) met certain efficiency and size standards, the act required local utilities to buy all of their electrical output (see Exhibit 1)