Sarah Novosel

Sarah Novosel served as a regulatory counsel in Enron’s Government Affairs department, based in the company’s Washington DC office. She specialized in Federal Energy Regulatory Commission proceedings, providing real-time analysis of FERC orders, tracking Regional Transmission Organization development, and coordinating Enron’s regulatory intervention strategy on federal energy policy. Working under Richard Shapiro and Steven Kean, she functioned as the Government Affairs team’s primary FERC interpreter during the 2000-2001 California energy crisis, translating dense regulatory orders into actionable intelligence for Enron’s leadership and trading operations.

Novosel does not have a dedicated PST archive in the Enron corpus. Her correspondence is preserved across the archives of colleagues, appearing in 8,459 emails across the collection, with the heaviest concentrations in Jeff Dasovich’s archive (2,105 mentions) and Steven Kean’s archive (3,789 mentions across multiple files). Within the Dasovich archive alone, she sent 257 emails between March 2000 and November 2002.

Background and Education

Novosel holds a bachelor’s degree in Government and Politics from the University of Maryland and a law degree from Georgetown University Law Center. She began her energy law career in 1991 at Bracewell & Patterson, a Washington DC law firm with a prominent energy practice, where she spent six years representing natural gas and power marketing clients before FERC. She left the firm in 1997 and joined Enron, bringing deep familiarity with FERC’s procedures, staff, and institutional culture.

Career at Enron

Government Affairs, Washington DC

Novosel worked from Enron’s Washington DC office, where the Government Affairs team maintained a presence to monitor and engage with federal regulators and legislators. She reported to Richard Shapiro (Vice President of Regulatory Affairs) and coordinated closely with Joe Hartsoe (Government Affairs counsel), Donna Fulton (FERC regulatory specialist), and the broader California-focused regulatory team that included Jeff Dasovich and Susan Mara on the West Coast.

Her role was distinct from those California-based colleagues. Where Dasovich tracked state legislative and political developments in Sacramento and Mara managed CPUC proceedings in San Francisco, Novosel covered the federal regulatory front from Washington. She monitored FERC meeting agendas, gathered intelligence from industry associations, analyzed Commission orders as they were issued, and distributed summaries to the Government Affairs team within hours.

An August 30, 2000 email illustrates her coordination role within the team. When introducing a new colleague, she wrote:

The email shows Novosel seamlessly combining team management with regulatory tracking, flagging a California PX price cap filing and its intervention deadline while orienting colleagues to a new team member’s expertise.

Areas of Focus

Novosel’s email subjects reveal a concentrated set of regulatory specializations:

• FERC order analysis: Summarizing and interpreting Commission orders on California markets, price caps, and refund proceedings
• RTO development: Tracking the creation of Regional Transmission Organizations, particularly PJM, New York ISO, and New England ISO
• California crisis proceedings: Monitoring FERC’s investigation of wholesale power markets, staff reports, and public conferences
• Industry association liaison: Serving as Enron’s contact with the Electric Power Supply Association (EPSA) for advance intelligence on FERC actions
• Congressional hearing preparation: Contributing to talking points and testimony preparation for FERC-related legislative proceedings

FERC Analysis During the California Energy Crisis

Novosel’s most intensive period of activity coincided with FERC’s response to the California energy crisis. Between August and December 2000, her email volume in the Dasovich archive surged from 32 emails in August to 78 in December, as the Commission issued a series of orders addressing soaring wholesale electricity prices in California.

The Section 206 Proceeding

On August 24, 2000, Novosel distributed one of her first major crisis-era analyses when FERC responded to San Diego Gas & Electric’s complaint against California power sellers:

The email captures Novosel’s analytical approach: she identified the headline outcome (price cap denied), then immediately flagged the two secondary proceedings that would have lasting consequences for Enron and the broader energy industry. The Section 206 investigation into rate reasonableness and the staff investigation into ISO/PX market design would both escalate over the following months.

Monitoring FERC Through the Crisis Peak

By November and December 2000, as California experienced rolling blackouts and wholesale prices reached unprecedented levels, Novosel’s correspondence focused on tracking FERC’s increasingly aggressive interventions. The top conversation topics in emails mentioning her name tell the story: “Comments on FERC November 1 order” (36 emails), “FERC Notice of Public Conference in San Diego” (32 emails), “Enron Response to San Diego Request for Gas Price Caps” (22 emails), and “FERC Investigation on California” (16 emails).

Her role as EPSA liaison gave Enron advance intelligence on Commission actions. A December 2000 email shows Novosel forwarding EPSA memos regarding possible industry responses to FERC’s December 15 order on California remedies, helping Enron calibrate its regulatory strategy against the positions of other market participants.

RTO Policy Work

Beyond California, Novosel tracked the development of Regional Transmission Organizations across the Eastern United States. This work ran parallel to Christi Nicolay’s focus on specific transmission agreements and interconnection proceedings, with Novosel providing the higher-level policy analysis of FERC’s RTO orders.

Her July 13, 2001 summary of the PJM RTO order demonstrates her role as the team’s analyst on these proceedings:

Novosel’s analysis of the PJM order focused on what mattered to Enron: the Commission’s push to expand Regional Transmission Organizations, which would create larger, more liquid wholesale power markets favorable to energy trading firms. Her promise of forthcoming New York and New England summaries indicates she was systematically analyzing every RTO order the Commission issued.

By October 2001, she was tracking FERC’s “RTO Week,” a set of invitation-only panels on market design, congestion management, and transmission planning. Her October 3, 2001 email provided the Government Affairs team with the panel schedule and topics before FERC had publicly announced them, intelligence she obtained through EPSA contacts:

A colleague, Alan Comnes, noted in a separate October 2001 email that “Sarah offered to help set up meetings with FERC staff too,” confirming that Novosel maintained direct relationships with Commission staff and served as a liaison for Enron’s regulatory engagement.

Final Months at Enron

Novosel’s email activity dropped sharply after mid-2001. From a peak of 78 emails in December 2000, her monthly volume in the Dasovich archive fell to 17 in July 2001, 4 in October, and just 1 each in November and December. Whether this reflects a departure from Enron or a shift in responsibilities is unclear from the email evidence alone.

Her last substantive communication in the corpus came on December 6, 2001, four days after Enron filed for bankruptcy, when she distributed an analysis of FERC’s decision to stay the California refund proceeding:

Even as Enron was unraveling, Novosel was still performing her core function: analyzing FERC orders and communicating their implications to the team. Her assessment that the rehearing order would likely be “a significant departure from the July 25 order” reflected the kind of informed regulatory judgment that had defined her role.

Her November 1, 2001 email, sent just weeks before the bankruptcy filing, had already hinted at the unpredictable regulatory environment:

The phrase “this new Commission has surprised us before” captured the uncertainty of working with FERC during a period when the Commission’s composition and approach had shifted under political pressure from the California crisis.

Key Correspondents

Novosel’s correspondence patterns place her firmly within the Government Affairs regulatory team, with her heaviest communication going to the California-focused specialists and the department’s senior leadership.

The heavy communication with Dasovich and Mara reflects the close coordination between Novosel’s federal regulatory work in Washington and the California-based team’s state-level proceedings. Many of her emails went to all three simultaneously, as FERC orders on California had immediate implications for the state-level strategy.

Email Activity

Novosel’s email patterns in the Dasovich archive track directly with FERC’s engagement in the California energy crisis.

The December 2000 peak of 78 emails coincides with FERC’s most consequential intervention in the California crisis. The sharp decline in 2001 may reflect a departure from Enron, a shift in responsibilities, or limitations in the available archives.

Post-Enron Career

After leaving Enron, Novosel worked for American Electric Power before joining Calpine Corporation in 2004 as Senior Regulatory Counsel. She was promoted in 2007 to Senior Vice President of Government Affairs and Managing Counsel, a position she continues to hold. Based in Washington DC, she has accumulated more than 30 years of energy law practice, making her one of the more experienced FERC practitioners in the industry. Her career trajectory from Bracewell & Patterson through Enron to Calpine traces the evolution of the deregulated energy industry itself.

Legal Status

Sarah Novosel was not among the Enron employees charged with crimes in connection with the company’s collapse. Her role focused on legitimate regulatory advocacy and FERC proceedings, distinct from the trading operations and financial engineering that became the focus of criminal prosecutions. There is no public evidence of involvement in market manipulation or accounting fraud.

See Also

• Richard Shapiro – VP Regulatory Affairs, Novosel’s supervisor
• Steven Kean – EVP and Chief of Staff, Government Affairs leadership
• Jeff Dasovich – California regulatory affairs, frequent correspondent
• Susan Mara – California regulatory specialist, frequent correspondent
• Christi Nicolay – FERC regulatory specialist, parallel role on transmission policy
• James Steffes – VP Regulatory Affairs
• Government Affairs – The department where Novosel worked
• California Energy Crisis – The crisis that drove Novosel’s peak activity

References

This article is based on analysis of Sarah Novosel’s correspondence preserved across multiple archives in the Enron email corpus, with 8,459 total mentions across the collection. Primary email data was drawn from Jeff Dasovich’s archive (2,105 mentions, 257 sent emails) and Steven Kean’s archive (3,789 mentions). Secondary sources consulted include:

• Calpine Corporation leadership page
• Biographical profiles documenting post-Enron career