Commitments and Contingencies

9 Months Ended

Sep. 30, 2015

Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract]

Unconditional Purchase Obligations

We and our subsidiaries routinely enter into long-term purchase and sale commitments for various quantities and lengths of time. Our natural gas utilities have obligations to distribute and sell natural gas to their customers, and our electric utilities have obligations to distribute and sell electricity to their customers. The utilities expect to recover costs related to these obligations in future customer rates. Our minimum future commitments related to these purchase obligations as of September 30, 2015, including those of our subsidiaries, was $12,586.8 million.

Environmental Matters

We periodically review our exposure for environmental remediation costs as evidence becomes available indicating that our liability has changed. Given current information, including the following, we believe that future costs in excess of the amounts accrued and/or disclosed on all presently known and quantifiable environmental contingencies will not be material to our financial position or results of operations.

We have a program of comprehensive environmental remediation planning for former manufactured gas plant sites and coal combustion product disposal/landfill sites. We perform ongoing assessments of these sites used by our utilities.

Manufactured Gas Plant Remediation

We have identified sites at which our utilities or a predecessor company owned or operated a manufactured gas plant or stored manufactured gas. We have also identified other sites that may have been impacted by historical manufactured gas plant activities. Our natural gas utilities are responsible for the environmental remediation of these sites, some of which are in the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Superfund Program. We are also working with various state jurisdictions in our investigation and remediation planning. All sites are at various stages of investigation, monitoring, remediation, and closure.

In addition, certain of our natural gas utilities are coordinating the investigation and cleanup of the sites subject to the jurisdiction of the EPA under what is called a "multisite" program. This program involves prioritizing the work to be done at the sites, preparation and approval of documents common to all of the sites, and use of a consistent approach in selecting remedies. At this time, we cannot estimate future remediation costs associated with these sites beyond those described below.

The future costs for detailed site investigation, future remediation, and monitoring are dependent upon several variables including, among other things, the extent of remediation, changes in technology, and changes in regulation. Historically, our regulators have allowed us to recover incurred costs, net of insurance recoveries and recoveries from potentially responsible parties, associated with the remediation of manufactured gas plant sites. Accordingly, we have established regulatory assets for costs associated with these sites.

We have established the following regulatory assets and reserves related to manufactured gas plant sites:



(in millions)	September 30, 2015		December 31, 2014
Regulatory assets	$	676.2	$	45.9
Reserves for future remediation	611.3		32.6

The increases in the regulatory assets and reserves are primarily related to balances associated with the Integrys regulated companies, which were acquired on June 29, 2015. See Note 2, Acquisition, for more information.