These executives are energizing the power business with their persistence, ideas and pure gut instincts.
What is an innovator? Must he, or she, be an inventor? Or merely an idea-prone CEO with a knack for building a string of successful companies? Or could an innovator be both a scientist and CEO?
In this first-ever feature, Fortnightly has chosen innovators from all segments of the energy business.
CUSTOMER SERVICE LINKED THE FIVE FINALISTS OF THE 1998 ULTRA competition, with all addressing, and improving, some aspect of serving end users.
The contest winner, Florida Power & Light Co., combined old hardware with new software and other innovations - such as using the Internet - to address a problem that plagues many utilities: how to cut the number of just-paid delinquent customers who call for power reconnects.
THE SUMMER OF 1996 OPENED COOLER THAN normal in June and July, cutting electric sales. When prices for natural gas did not fall as expected, as a counterbalance Consolidated Edison Co. of New York entered a combined gas-conversion and weather-heading transaction with power marketer Aquila Energy, giving Con Ed some measure of protection against further revenue shortfalls in August.
FOR THE FIRST TIME IN DECADES, A GROWING NUMBER of consumers are able to choose who supplies their electric power and, perhaps more importantly, where that power comes from. Evidence is mounting that this ability to exercise choice may give a long-needed shot in the arm to the deployment of renewable energy technologies.
National polls consistently reveal that between 40 and 70 percent of those sampled say they would pay a premium for environmental protection or for renewable energy, and utility company surveys reinforce those findings.
DEREGULATION PRESENTS WHAT IS PERHAPS THE BEST opportunity yet for renewables to stake a lasting claim in the electricity market.
Since most energy from renewable sources still isn't priced competitively with fossil-fueled technologies, many restructuring proposals at state and federal levels include various support mechanisms intended to drive down the renewable generation costs. The initial added expense is a necessary trade-off, advocates say, for the resulting reductions in emissions and energy price volatility.
MANY PLAYERS IN THE ELECTRIC INDUSTRY HAVE COME to believe that energy-only prices will soon replace the hundred-year tradition of pricing both energy and capacity.
This idea, sometimes called "monomic" trading, offers a seductive simplicity. Even so, research indicates that it is unlikely to work well.
First, consider some terminology. Traditional electric markets contain prices for both energy and capacity. Energy prices pertain to the actual kilowatt-hours. Capacity prices pertain to the right to take energy.
Minnesota has lots of drafts, but no final plan.
So you think your state has been busy? In Minnesota, the 1997 legislative session saw more than a dozen new bills introduced on electric, gas and energy issues.
At the start of the session many expected that electric deregulation would play a major part in the legislative program. However, Gov. Carlson reports now that legislators will defer work on the issue until the 1998 session. Several electric industry deregulation bills were introduced at the end of the session, but when last we checked no hearings had been held.
Some in Congress would link customer choice with a portfolio standard. How would that play in a wholesale power market where gas turbines rule the roost?
By Michael C. Brower and Brian Parsons
WHAT KINDS OF POWER PLANTS WILL
get built in a deregulated electric industry? If recent history offers any guide, utilities and independent power companies will succumb to the traditional wisdom and invest in gas-fired combustion turbines and combined-cycle plants. Sound reasons may exist for doing so. The plants are less expensive than conventional steam plants. They put less capital at risk.
Enron Corp. has purchased wind-power developer and manufacturer, Zond Corp. of Tehachapi, Calif., and plans to form a new business unit, the Enron Renewable Energy Corp., which will be responsible for developing renewable energy sources for Enron.
"Renewable energy will capture a significant share of the world energy market over the next 20 years, and Enron intends to be a leader in this very important market," says Kenneth Lay, Enron Chairman and CEO. According to predictions by the American Wind Energy Association, global wind capacity should reach 23,500 MW by 2005. (em LB
Ronald L. Adams, an executive from Transcontinental Gas Pipeline, was named president of CNG Transmission Corp. He replaces L.J. Timms, Jr., who retired.
Lee Elder was hired by GE Nuclear Energy as manager of market development. Elder was g.m. of nuclear marketing and technology for Black & Veatch and started a joint venture between the two companies to service boiling water reactors.
The Oklahoma Corporation Commission has hired Richard L. Heck, a former U.S.