Regulation, Pricing, and Comparative Performance in the US Electric Utility Industry by Ownership Type

摘要

Purpose of this report is to assess issues that differentiate investor-owned electric utilities and publicly owned electric utilities in the context of providing recommendations for modeling the US electric utility industry on the basis of ownership type. Four ownership types were included for evaluation: (1) investor-owned electric utilities; (2) state/municipal electric systems (which include municipally owned electric utilities, state and county projects, public utility districts, and joint action agencies); (3) rural electric cooperatives; and (4) federal power projects. Defining the publicly owned segment as the latter three ownership types, the basis of modeling recommendations was an evaluation of the regulation, pricing, associated financial/economic issues, and comparative performance of publicly and privately owned electric systems. The associated financial/economic issues include taxation, depreciation policy, sources of capital, capital structure, and the treatment of Construction Work in Progress. Performance by the four ownership types was compared over the 1979-1981 period. Areas of comparison include cost of capital, financial indicators, and operating results on a percentage of revenues and unit sales basis. (ERA citation 10:031171)