Efficient markets or efficient loads?: Impacts from electric utility restructuring
Restructuring of the electric utility industry is underway. This is in response to many influences, including drives to deregulate the industry, new regulatory initiatives, changing power markets, and new technology. The changing utility industry will provide Federal power customers with new opportunities to reduce costs and increase service. However, the instability in the current environment is certain to reduce near-term opportunities to collaborate with local utilities on DSM and other efficiency projects as the economics of these projects are now uncertain. This paper discusses this instability and its impacts on demand side management and other efficiency projects. Historically, electricity services have been provided to consumers through integrated utilities that used their own generation and transmission to distribute power to captive customers as a regulated monopoly. There are municipal and other publicly owned utilities that own no generation or transmission and only distribute power. Similarly, there are publicly owned generation and transmission companies that wholesale power and have no retail customers. Nevertheless, most of the power used in the country is provided by integrated, regulated investor-owned utilities. Competition was introduced in the industry with the Public Utility Regulatory Policy Act of 1976 (PURPA). This legislation opened the door to the development of generation by third parties. The development of third-party generating facilities grew steadily until the mid- 1980s when it finally surpassed utility construction as the norm for new power supplies. The transformation of the power generation business is, in part, a spill over from deregulation of the airline and gas industries. The first resulted in more efficient turbines, which are used for both airplane engines and small generators, and the second resulted in lower natural gas prices, which made gas-fired generation the least cost generating option.
- OSTI ID:
- 227064
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-951173-; TRN: 96:000139-0028
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 18. world energy engineering congress, Atlanta, GA (United States), 8-10 Nov 1995; Other Information: PBD: 1996; Related Information: Is Part Of Vision 2001: Energy & environmental engineering; PB: 638 p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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