Integrated resource Planning (IRP) focuses on providing customer energy-service needs at the lowest cost. This paper addresses the flip side of IRP, how shareholders -are when utilities build power plants with different capital and operating costs, buy power from others, or run demand-side...

The energy industry generally and petroleum and natural gas operations in particular are frequently reacting to a variety of unsettling forces. Falling oil prices, economic upswings, currency devaluations, increasingly rigorous environmental quality standards, deregulation of electricity...

The theme of this symposium to look ahead almost a quarter century to 2020 gives one the freedom to speculate more than usual in projections for coal. It is important to attempt to take a long term look into the future of coal and energy, so that one can begin to prepare for major changes on the...

The only way resources can be efficiently allocated in our market system is if prices of resources, goods, and services properly reflect their true value to society. However, because of (a) imperfections in the pricing mechanisms that currently influence private-sector decision making; (b) the...

A tool is presented to quantify the risks of geothermal projects, the Geothermal Probabilistic Cost Model (GPCM). The GPCM model is used to evaluate a geothermal reservoir for a binary-cycle electric plant at Heber, California. Three institutional aspects of the geothermal risk which can shift...

The Iranian economy and political situation have undergone radical changes since the 1979 Islamic revolution. The excesses of the early years of the revolution have gradually given way to moderation and a more pragmatic economic policy--based on the principles of the free market. The petroleum...