The course focuses primarily on the regulation and design of electricity systems and markets, since so many energy choices the use of oil, natural gas, coal, nuclear, the green alternatives such as solar, wind, and energy conservation or demand side management relate to the way we generate or deliver electricity, or avoid the need to do so. Next to the use of petroleum for transportation, electric generation is the greatest contributor to air pollution and the greatest source of greenhouse gas emissions. In addition, as urban and suburban development spread across the land, the maintenance and expansion of the electric transmission grid provide increasingly challenging land use problems.
The course examines both the traditional monopoly model of regulation and evolving competitive alternatives. The course exposes students to energy resource planning, pollution management, rate design, green markets, energy efficiency, demand side management, renewable energy portfolios, climate change, and carbon management. The course provides an introduction to administrative law and to practice issues in the field.
Lesson content
Lec 1 Introduction to Energy and Electricity
Lec 2 Public Utilities & Rate Regulation: Intro to Finance
Lec 3 Public Utilities & Rate Regulation: Cost of Service Regulation (Part 1)
Lec 4 - Public Utilities & Rate Regulation
Lec 5 - Public Utilities and Rate Regulation
Lec 6 - Resource Alternatives: Tradition Fuels, Oil and Hydroelectric Power
Lec 8 - Resource Alternatives: Natural Gas
Lec 9 - Resource Alternatives: Renewable Energy - The Technologies
Lec 10 - Demand Side Management: Energy Efficiency
Lec 11 - Performance Based Ratemaking and Decoupling; and Integrate
Lec 12 - Deregulation and Markets: Wholesale Electricity Markets
Lec 14 - Climate Change and Carbon Markets;
Lec 15 - Course Review
Deregulation and Markets & Env Impacts of Restructuring
Resource Alternatives: Coal and Nuclear Power