- Industry: Energy
- Number of terms: 9078
- Number of blossaries: 0
- Company Profile:
California’s primary energy policy and planning agency
The substations, transformers and lines that convey electricity from high-power transmission lines to ultimate consumers. See GRID.
Industry:Energy
The amount of electric power for which a generating unit, generating station, or other electrical apparatus is rated either by the user or manufacturer. The term is also used for the total volume of natural gas that can flow through a pipeline over a given amount of time, considering such factors as compression and pipeline size. There are various types of electricity capacity: Dependable Capacity: The systems's ability to carry the electric power for the time interval and period specific, when related to the characteristics of the load to be supplied. Dependable capacity is determined by such factors as capability, operating power factor, weather, and portion of the load the station is to supply. Installed (or Nameplate) Capacity: The total manufacturer-rated capacities of equipment such as turbines, generators, condensers, transformers, and other system components. Peaking Capacity: The capacity of generating equipment intended for operation during the hours of highest daily, weekly or seasonal loads. Purchased Capacity: The amount of energy and capacity available for purchase from outside the system. Reserve Capacity: Extra generating capacity available to meet peak or abnormally high demands for power and to generate power during scheduled or unscheduled outages. Units available for service, but not maintained at operating temperature, are termed "cold." those units ready and available for service, though not in actual operation, are termed "hot."
Industry:Energy
The regulated electric utility entity that constructs and maintains the distribution wires connecting the transmission grid to the final customer. The Disco can also perform other services such as aggregating customers, purchasing power supply and transmission services for customers, billing customers and reimbursing suppliers, and offering other regulated or non-regulated energy services to retail customers. The "wires" and "customer service" functions provided by a distribution utility could be split so that two totally separate entities are used to supply these two types of distribution services.
Industry:Energy
A percentage that tells how much of a power plant's capacity is used over time. For example, typical plant capacity factors range as high as 80 percent for geothermal and 70 percent for co-generation.
Industry:Energy
An Independent Power Producer (IPP) generates power that is purchased by an electric utility at wholesale prices. The utility then resells this power to end-use customers. Although IPPs generate power, they are not franchised utilities, government agencies or QFs. IPPs usually do not own transmission lines to transmit the power that they generate.
Industry:Energy
The stripping off of one utility function from the others by selling (spinning-off) or in some other way changing the ownership of the assets related to that function. Most commonly associated with spinning-off generation assets so they are no longer owned by the shareholders that own the transmission and distribution assets. (See also "Disaggregation.")
Industry:Energy
A secondary market for capacity that is contracted by a customer which is not using all of its capacity.
Industry:Energy
Power and heat derived from sources native to California. These include geothermal, hydro, biomass, solar and wind energy. The term usually is understood to include cogeneration facilities.
Industry:Energy
The amount of ionizing radiation energy absorbed per unit mass of irradiated material at a specific location, such as a part of a human body.
Industry:Energy
A customer who does not have realistic alternatives to buying power from the local utility, even if that customer had the legal right to buy from competitors.
Industry:Energy
