[en] A electricity power system is designed and built to deliver reliable power supplies. A failure of a single component should not lead to the failure of the entire system. Oversupply results in prices at marginal cost of production, inadequate return on capital investment and economic failure of supplies. Uneconomic sources of supply would pull out in cases of oversupply. Competitive markets need flexible supply and demand and scarcity pricing in order to promote new investment. The problem with such a scenario is that scarcity reduces the level of reliability. An oversupply, while ensuring reliability, offers an inadequate return on capital. This presentation included several graphs depicting results of market failure with reference to NYMEX analysis of credit quality, NEPOOL summer capacity 2001, NYS summer capacity 2001, and PJM summer capacity 2001. A graph illustrating a New England 2002 load duration curve and its analysis was also included. According to the author, the market design is flawed because it does not pay for reliability. It fails to compensate generation for capital at risk, and it fails to address the fact that nearly half of the capacity supplies less than 10 per cent energy. He notes that the liquidity crisis will continue and grow unless changes are made and new entrants come into the market. 8 figs

[en] A total of 207 Public Service Company of Indiana, Inc., nonunion employees have voluntarily retired or resigned as part of a cost-cutting work force reduction plan the utility said will hurt earnings in 1989 but will help realize savings in the future. Those who chose to resign will receive one week's pay for each year of service up to 26 years. To keep staffing at a reduced level PSI will put stricter limitations on filling positions

[en] The question 'How competent does a gas supply company have to be' is currently on the minds of many company managers. In the paper is given the answer by an urban company in Germany. For the company are defined its core business which cannot be entrusted to external contractors and the safety-related activities which can be entrusted to service providers. As well is given an overview about the organisation of the technical division and its fields of activity. (au)

[en] The electricity sector is undergoing a restructuring due to deregulation. This might present a challenge to safety. Safety issues cannot be separated from organizational issues. They must be an integral part of the change process from the very beginning. This overview is based on a study of recent literature about organizational development and change management in general. The 'multi standard' organizations of today are no consistent creations, but conglomerates of loosely coupled units. This form of organization has developed during the latest 30-40 years and is also called a 'network organization'. Relatively autonomous groups of actors are identifying themselves with the same type of groups in other organizations and they meet on external scenes of development. They are for instance human resource experts, managers on different levels, safety delegates, quality experts, engineers and economists. The expansion of the network enterprise also means a closer interaction with suppliers and customers. Impulses of change are reaching the organization from many angles and this creates plenty of imbalances and tensions. The traditional view that changes are initiated and steered top - down is challenged. The organizations of today are difficult to change in a planned way due to the influence of those powerful forces. The organizational behavior is not so 'rational' as could be expected. A strong, but often neglected force, is the social or symbolic environment of an organization. The organizational identity is formed in relation to other significant organizations and actors. The search for identity is a powerful driving force. Norms and conventions are influencing how a company shall be organized at a certain period of time. Several organizational models and concepts, often of American origin, have been replacing each other's during recent years. Marketing, fashion and actions of significant others are also influencing the behavior of organizations. Inherent of the 'programmatic' change strategy is that changes can be planned and implemented in detail. This strategy can work under conditions that are clearly defined and demarcated, but are less useful when people are to be mobilized and when attitudes, values and ways of working are to be changed. An alternative approach is the 'learning strategy', in which the participation of those concerned is essential. The idea is that learning and shared control of the situation will be developed through dialogues and common activities. When the total organization is to be restructured a strategy for dealing with several parallel change processes is needed. Creating developmental networks is a new strategy based on cooperation between companies. Networks can also be formed within a 'loosely coupled' enterprise. The network strategy is built on cooperation between several self-steering units, which gives the possibility to work with change processes in several units at the same time. This will have several advantages. The change process will be speeded up, a more informal and situational way of working is possible, and development and spreading can be made in parallel. The point of departure of a planned change process is to create a vision of the future. This vision will then steer the change work. For change to come trough every one involved has to understand the reasons for change and share the vision. The first step is to get everybody to understand the motives for change. The implementation will then be a joint realization of the vision. The change process is ideally driven by a 'learning' way of working, which means formulating stepwise, measurable goals, developing of solutions, making up and continuously monitoring action plans, and reflecting over the results. By trying and reflecting the organization will be altered. Of utmost importance for a new identity to be formed is the staff's participation and their possibilities of personal development. The phases of the change process are in practice iterative, they will be repeated when formulating stepwise goals, making action plans implementing, monitoring and reflecting over what has been achieved. This will develop organizational change competence. The phases are over-lapping. Not only one, but several processes are going on in different phases. The on-going change processes have to be coordinated and synchronized. The safety issues cannot be separated from other organizational issues. All organizational changes have to be synchronized. Issues of competence and staffing have to be continuously analyzed. The motivation of the staff will be effected in the beginning of a change process. Participation is a key to success. The work organization must be continuously developed. 'Just in time'- thinking can be in conflict with 'just in case'- thinking in high-risk environments. Under manning. Temporary staff. Outsourcing. A recommended way of preparing for change is to engage all the staff in the development of a company strategy for change

[en] Deregulated energy markets were founded on the Merchant Power Producer, a stand-alone generator that sold its production to the spot and short-term forward markets, underpinned by long-dated project finance. The initial enthusiasm that existed for investment in existing and new merchant power plant capacity shortly after power system deregulation has progressively dissipated, following an excess entry result. In this article, we demonstrate why this has become a global trend. Using debt-sizing parameters typically used by project banks, we model a benchmark plant, then re-simulate its performance using live energy market price data and find that such financings are no longer feasible in the absence of long-term Power Purchase Agreements. - Highlights: ► We model a hypothetical CCGT plant in QLD under project financing constraints typical of the industry. ► We simulate plant operations with live market data to analyse the results. ► We find that a plant which should represent the industry's long-run marginal cost is not a feasible investment.

[en] Direct Energie, a major player in France and Belgium, has compelled recognition as a well-balanced operator in the production and supply of electricity and natural gas. Having made innovation one of the major axes of its development, this firm is using digital technology for the energy transition and in response to consumer needs. Direct Energie, a supplier of 'energy 4.0', is seeking to position itself as a leader in 'orchestrating' the consumption of energy by its customers. Given this strong position as the single supplier of energy to its customers, the regulatory framework for data transmission must be reviewed to make it compatible with the 'single contract', which binds a customer to a firm that both supplies and transports energy

[en] Stranded costs are those costs that electric utilities are currently permitted to recover through their rates but whose recovery may be impeded or prevented by the advent of competition in the industry. Estimates of these costs run from the tens to the hundreds of billions of dollars. Should regulators permit utilities to recover stranded costs while they take steps to promote competition in the electric power industry. William Baumol and J. Gregory Sidak argue that answer to that question should be yes.The authors show that a transmission price, the price for sending electricity over the transmission grid, can be determined in a manner that is compatible with economic efficiency and clearly neutral in its effects upon all competitors in electricity generation. A correctly constructed regime of transmission pricing may in fact achieve the efficiency and equity goals that justify the recovery of stranded costs

[en] This paper seeks to evaluate unrealized economies of vertical integration for rural electric cooperatives. Given the well-established network economies that are inherent in the generation, transmission, and distribution of electricity, the coops long-standing choice of market structure is questionable (especially if their strategy is welfare maximization). Organized as either generation-and-transmission or distribution-only, the traditional measures of vertical economies will not work. Thus, I have devised an alternative method by which to measure such economies and find that, on average, cost savings in excess of 39% could have been realized had the coops adopted a vertically integrated structure. (author)

[en] As electricity markets deregulate and energy tariffs increasingly expose customers to commodity price volatility, it is difficult for energy consumers to assess the economic value of investments in technologies that manage electricity demand in response to changing energy prices. The key uncertainties in evaluating the economics of demand-response technologies are the level and volatility of future wholesale energy prices. In this paper, we demonstrate that financial engineering methodologies originally developed for pricing equity and commodity derivatives (e.g., futures, swaps, options) can be used to estimate the value of demand-response technologies. We adapt models used to value energy options and assets to value three common demand-response strategies: load curtailment, load shifting or displacement, and short-term fuel substitution-specifically, distributed generation. These option models represent an improvement to traditional discounted cash flow methods for assessing the relative merits of demand-side technology investments in restructured electricity markets. (author)

[en] The regulation of distribution utilities is evolving from the traditional approach based on a cost of service or rate of return remuneration, to ways of regulation more specifically focused on providing incentives for improving efficiency, known as performance-based regulation or ratemaking. Modern regulation systems are also, to a higher degree than previously, intended to simulate competitive market conditions. The Market Design 2003-conference gathered people from 18 countries to discuss 'Methods to regulate unbundled transmission and distribution business on electricity markets'. Speakers from nine different countries and backgrounds (academics, industry and regulatory) presented their experiences and most recent works on how to make the regulation of unbundled distribution business as accurate as possible. This paper does not claim to be a fully representative summary of everything that was presented or discussed during the conference. Rather, it is a purposely restricted document where we focus on a few central themes and experiences from different countries