Rezachek & Associates'
Energy & Environmental Resources

Utility Integration of Renewables

Supply Side/IRP/DSM

Demand Side Management This chapter develops the DSM program options for peak load management utilizing captive power generation. Section 4.1 begins with an assessment of the peak load management potential. This is followed in Section 4.2 with an analysis of the private cost of self-generation from the perspective of industrial customers who own and operate such plant. This cost, together with estimates of PLN's "avoided cost," bracket the range within which a power purchase tariff would be set. Section 4.3 discusses the incentive tariff structure for the DSM options.

Issues In The Valuation Of PV/Renewables: Estimating The Present Value of Externality Streams With A Digression on DSM This paper continues and extends previous research dealing with the role of financial risk measurement in the valuation of renewable and conventional energy technologies. This previous work [Awerbuch, 1993] concludes that proper valuation of resource alternatives in the context of IRP can be made with the application of market-based, (risk-adjusted) discount rates, as opposed to the present practice of discounting all revenue requirement components at the firm's weighted average cost of capital (WACC).

Integrated Resource Planning Relatively recently, utility planners and policy makers began to identify new approaches to meeting customer demand. At first, they looked at cost issues involved with supply and demand planning. The new methodology became known as least-cost planning (LCP) or least-cost utility planning (LCUP). As the process evolved to include more societal goals and strategic planning, it became popular to call it integrated resource planning (IRP). That is now the more common term, although both names are used. By the end of the 1980s, more than 31 Public Utility Commissions (PUCs) had adopted IRP procedures. All electric utilities, by law, now file integrated resource plans.

IRP and Competition The passage of the Energy Policy Act of 1992 (EPAct), which embraces both increased competition and greater reliance on integrated resource planning (IRP), has fueled a discussion on whether IRP and competition are compatible. This question is not new. It has been before regulators and utility planners since Congress increased competition in the electric industry through passage of the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act of 1978 (PURPA). In the fifteen years since PURPA was enacted, utilities across the country have lowered the cost of providing energy services by successfully combining the elements of IRP and competition. EPAct now codifies this synergy.

U.S. Electric Utility Demand-Side Management 1996 (Download PDF version of the entire Publication) Demand-Side Management (DSM) consists of electric utilities' planning, implementing, and monitoring of activities designed to encourage consumers to modify their levels and patterns of electricity consumption. These activities are performed to benefit utilities, consumers, and society. Utilities implement DSM programs to achieve two basic objectives: energy efficiency and load management.

U.S. Electric Utility Demand-Side Management: Trends and Analysis Growing competition in the electric power industry is raising questions regarding the future of utility demand-side management (DSM) programs. This article addresses changes in the growth and character of electric utility DSM and how growing competition and the imminent restructuring of the electric power industry may affect utility DSM practices.