California Deregulation Plan
Deregulation is the elimination of regulated rate tariffs on energy that is supplied. Deregulation ultimately spreads the risk of an energy crisis amongst multiple companies in a specific region then on one monopoly company. What it boils down to is, big money. Whether it is a natural gas company or a supplier of energy, the main goal is to make profit. Over the past years in California, it can be seen that many energy suppliers have been working to bring down the cost of making and providing energy while staying in line with the deregulation mandates, in doing so, they have made it almost impossible for themselves to make economic profit. There are many reasons why electricity deregulation happens, and California has seen just about all of them. Many have put their money on the deregulation plan of the state. It is believed that this plan that was signed in 1996, by former Governor Pete Wilson, holds most of weight of the problem. The plan was intended to bring more competition into the state's electricity industry. At the time the plan was signed, California's major utilities sold several of their power plants to a number of electricity wholesalers. But the plan did not give power suppliers much of a motivation to inc
Another factor in the energy crisis can be found in the Northwest part of the state. In this part of California, power is produced by hydroelectric power plants. With a decrease in rain fall and snowfall the production of energy has also decreased. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ With the increasing demand for electricity, unregulated wholesale energy prices have increased dramatically. The problem here is that the price paid by a consumer is a much lower cost then what the supplier is paying for the electricity. This is driving some of the larger suppliers into debt. Some suppliers have said that filing for bankruptcy may be the only option if the state or federal government does not intervene. In the past ten years, California has not seen any new major power plants being built. Currently, the state has four new plants underway, and plans for a fifth. But, out of the five new plants not one will be ready for operation by the summer season. The summer season is the season in which California experiences its highest consumption of energy. Not all of the electricity that is consumed in California is produced there. There are many out-of-state suppliers that provide electricity to
Some common words found in the essay are:
Pete Wilson, Transition Charge, , Northwest California, energy crisis, demand electricity, power plants, california seen, deregulation plan, charge customer bills, competitive metering billing, metering billing, competitive metering, summer season, charge customer, energy suppliers,
Approximate Word count = 840
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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