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Load Management Made Simple
Abstract
Up until the 1970's electric utilities were basically in a
supply side management mode, in which
plants were built to serve whatever
demand customers required. However in the last 10-
15 years, many utilities, including Texas Utilities
Electric Company have moved to a demand side or
load management mode which seeks to influence customers
to change electric usage patterns to more
efficiently use available generating capacity.
Since 1970, the TUEC system peak demand has more
than doubled from about 7400 MW to almost 16000 MW
projected in 1985. The cost and difficulty of
building new power plants to serve this load has
caused TUEC to use load management as a tool to
slow this demand growth.
Six load management strategies will be
discussed:
1. Peak clipping
2. Strategic conservation
3. Valley filling
4. Strategic load growth
5. Load shifting
6. Flexible load shape
Research is required to determine which types
of loads or types of customers contribute most heavily to system peak demands and thus should be
targeted for load management programs. Furthermore, rates which accurately reflect the cost to
serve a customer can be used as a load management
tool. Load management has significantly reduced
TUEC's need for new power plants over the last 5
years and will continue to create a situation in
which both customers and the utility will benefit.
Citation
Schneider, K. (1985). Load Management Made Simple. Energy Systems Laboratory (http://esl.tamu.edu); Texas A&M University (http://www.tamu.edu). Available electronically from https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /6821.