The spotlight is on. But true stardom will require more direction from utilities.
Wind has become today’s hit—a potential blockbuster, even—but still needing that one big break. To make it big, utilities will have to lead the charge as owners. That will force utilities to consider and evaluate the significant credit implications that can arise when signing a power purchase agreement with developers that lack deep pockets, or implement fly- by-night schemes.
Can markets co-exist with renewable mandates?
Part way through the Feb. 27 conference on electric competition, it was so quiet you could hear a hockey puck slide across the ice. No, hell had not frozen over. Rather, it was Commissioner Marc Spitzer, who had found a clever story to ease the tension and allay fears that FERC somehow might want to undo the sins of the past, and give up its dream of workable markets for wholesale power.
Using demand response to mitigate rate shocks.
In the minds of many policy-makers, DR has become associated with rate shocks, rate volatility, unpredictability, and loss of control over energy costs—the very things DR was designed to overcome. What can be done to change this?
How demand response programs contribute to energy efficiency and environmental quality.
Demand response reduces overall energy usage, but the magnitude of the reduction depends on whether the technologies are developed and deployed with efficiency in mind.
A new law dampens coal-by-wire prospects.
A 2007 law essentially prohibits California utilities from signing long-term contracts for power, including those from out of state, unless they emit less than 1,000 pounds of CO2/MWh of electricity produced. While the law does not specifically bar coal-fired generation, the limit is set low enough to rule out all coal-power plants. A modern, highly efficient natural gas-fired plant barely would qualify. These measures, plus the new carbon-cap law going into effect by 2012, have sent utilities—large and small, private as well as municipal or city-owned—into a frenzy as they scramble to find alternatives to coal to meet their future demand.
The intelligent-grid vision is becoming clearer as utilities take incremental steps toward a brighter future.
Building the intelligent grid will require less technical innovation than it does strategic innovation—a characteristic not typically ascribed to U.S. regulated utilities. But the utility culture is changing—by necessity, if not by choice.
Three challenges to federal authority from those unhappy with the status quo.
A look at how regulators, grid operators, and consumer advocates in Arkansas, California and Connecticut have posed challenges to established law and policy at FERC.
The resource overbuild in the West complicates the company’s efforts.
Calpine’s announcement that it will shed 20 of its 92 power plants, close three offices, and lay off 775 more staff in a bid to emerge from bankruptcy caused by more than $22 billion in total debt was not unexpected. The question is whether these actions will be sufficient to get the job done.
The models and motives behind tomorrow’s transmission expansion.
Major transmission projects based on two distinct models are showing signs of life. What can these projects teach us about future transmission investment?
A review of total shareholder returns shows how growth and merger strategies drove performance last year.
To better understand the performance of the electric utility sector from both a short-term and long-term perspective, we examined the total shareholder return (TSR)—dividends plus change in stock price—of 58 electric companies for 2005 and for three- and five-year periods. We grouped these companies into four categories to better understand the impact of alternative strategies on investor performance: Recovering, Traditionalist, Growth, and Merger.