Become a PUF Member Organization

Law & Lawyers

Off Peak

Why do U.S. electric bills continue to climb, when other liberalized Western countries are seeing reductions?

Off Peak

October 1, 2000

Dereg Dilemma

Why do U.S. electric bills continue to climb, when other liberalized Western countries are seeing reductions?

Electric deregulation in the United States isn't slashing consumer bills the way it has in other countries. Despite continuing restructuring, the price of U.S. electricity ranked second-highest in an April survey of 14 major Western economies.

Read Entire Article

Politics as Usual: A Roadmap to Backlash, Backtracking, and Re-regulation

Utility reform gone wrong-tales from FERC, Florida, Wisconsin, and California.

1 Worse, new institutions such as the California ISO seem to believe falsely that their actions will not have serious spillover effects outside their immediate jurisdictional concerns. Electric utilities in neighboring states know that they indeed are affected by Cal-ISO pricing policy and terms of service.

2 .

Byline: 
Charles J. Cicchetti, Ph.D. and Colin M. Long, J.D.
Read Entire Article

Frontlines

Some thoughts on the battle to measure electricity consumption in real time.

Frontlines

Meter Men?

 

 

Some thoughts on the battle to measure electricity consumption in real time.

How can something so simple as an electric meter bring governments, editors, and the utility industry to their knees?

Byline: 
Bruce W. Radford
Read Entire Article

Distributed Generation: Setting a Fair Price in the Distribution Tariff

1 Some utilities may question this concept. San Diego Gas & Electric argued in California's DG investigation that distributed generation does not always lead to a reduction in distribution plant investment, and that any investment savings is not kilowatt for kilowatt. And the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has taken a more extreme position, allowing a utility to charge a fee for distributed generators delivering electricity into the distribution grid.

Byline: 
Mark B. Lively
Read Entire Article

A Eulogy for RTOs—Interregional is Better

Thoughts on the eve of FERC's filing deadline for regional transmission organizations.

1 Ilic, Zaborszky, "Dynamics and Control of Large Electric Power Systems," John Wiley & Sons, 2000 (800 page text).

2 Ilic, Arce, Yoon, Fumagali, "Assessing Reliability Under Open Access," to be published in The Electricity Journal, December 2000.

3 For more information, please contact the author and/or the MIT Technology Licensing Office, making reference to MIT Case # 9062.

Byline: 
Marija Ilic
Read Entire Article

Off Peak

Experts predict top 10 energy innovations for 2010.

Off Peak

October 15, 2000

Life in the Aughts

Experts predict top 10 energy innovations for 2010.

Before we've even agreed on a name for the coming decade, energy experts are predicting life-altering changes by 2010.

Read Entire Article

News Digest

News Digest


 

State PUCs

Restructuring Plans. The Ohio PUC denied rehearing of its restructuring order for FirstEnergy issued two months earlier, rejecting arguments by all petitioners-utility, marketers, and consumer watchdog groups.

Byline: 
Case No. 99-1212- EL-ETP, Sept. 13, 2000 (Ohio P.U.C.)
Read Entire Article

Frontlines

DC power makes a comeback in this vision of neighborhood grids and fuel cells on wheels.

Frontlines

Engineers Have Their Day

 

Byline: 
Bruce W. Radford
Read Entire Article