ABSTRACT
From solar, wind, tidal, biomass, or countless other energy generation technologies from renewable sources to new means of transmissions and storage of electricity to smart grid technologies to energy efficiency-all of these emerging sectors interface with electric utilities. Electric utilities are natural monopolies. Rather than stringing up several duplicate sets of electric power lines in each neighborhood, there is one set of power lines to transmit electricity to the customers. Once electricity is produced in a generating station it is placed into the high-voltage transmission system. Most of these transmission lines are owned by the electric utilities generating the electricity. The transmission system delivers electricity from the power plants to distribution substations and from these substations to consumers. Residential, commercial, and industrial customers consume electricity in a myriad ways.
