Ancillary services
Frequency regulation, spinning and non-spinning reserves — the second-by-second balancing services priced in their own markets.
Resource adequacy frameworks
Four different approaches to ensuring enough generation: capacity markets, bilateral RA, and ERCOT's energy-only.
FERC Order 2222
The federal mandate opening wholesale markets to DER aggregations — what your behind-the-meter assets can now earn.
Measurement & verification
IPMVP, ASHRAE 14, and how energy savings get measured — the methodology that turns efficiency claims into incentive payments.
Capacity market
A forward market where generators are paid to commit to being available during peak demand periods, regardless of whether they actually run. Ensures resour...
Green tariffs
Utility programs that let C&I buyers go renewable without a direct PPA — how they work, what they deliver, and when they make sense.
How electricity prices are set
Locational marginal pricing — what every wholesale settlement actually pays out. Energy + congestion + losses, why basis is the real exposure, and how FTRs ...
Building certifications
LEED, ENERGY STAR, and BREEAM — what each measures, what they cost to achieve, and the energy procurement implications.
Sustainability reporting & energy
Scope 2 emissions, market-based vs. location-based accounting, RE100, CDP, SBTi, and what quality of renewable procurement actually matters.
Virtual PPA (VPPA)
A financial contract, also called a contract for differences, where a corporate buyer agrees to pay a fixed price for renewable energy and receives the flo...
Virtual PPAs explained
The financial contract that lets corporations go renewable without physical delivery — how VPPAs work and where they fall short.
NEPA & transmission permitting
Why transmission takes 10+ years to build, what FERC Order 1920 actually changes, and why permitting is the binding constraint.
RGGI & state carbon markets
The Northeast carbon program embedded in your bill, California's cap-and-trade, and the auction prices that just hit record highs.
Transmission & congestion
Why LMPs vary across short distances, how constraints create basis spreads, and what grid-enhancing technologies can do.
Nodal pricing
A pricing approach that calculates a unique LMP at every node (bus) on the transmission network. Used by PJM, CAISO, MISO, NYISO, and SPP. Contrast with zo...
Heat rate
A measure of power plant efficiency — the number of BTUs of fuel required to generate one kilowatt-hour of electricity. A lower heat rate means greater eff...
Wholesale electricity market
A market where electricity is bought and sold in bulk between generators, utilities, and large customers before it reaches end consumers. Wholesale markets...
Corporate energy procurement
How large companies structure their energy function — from strategy and risk policy to multi-site portfolio management.
The merit order
The dispatch stack that sets the marginal clearing price every interval. Why high-renewable hours flatten the curve and create negative prices.
Congestion
A condition where transmission constraints prevent the lowest-cost generation from serving all load. Congestion adds to the LMP at constrained nodes and is...
Weather & grid risk
Winter Storm Uri, CAISO Heat Dome, hurricane Beryl, and PSPS — how extreme weather tests the grid.
Behind-the-meter solar
How commercial rooftop solar makes money — net metering, demand charge offsets, the 30% ITC, and what drives payback for C&I systems.
Renewable energy certificate (REC)
A tradable certificate representing one megawatt-hour of electricity generated from a qualifying renewable source. RECs are used by corporations to substan...
Black start & resilience
How operators rebuild a grid after a complete blackout — which generators can self-start and the cranking path.
The ISOs and RTOs
Seven US ISOs run roughly two-thirds of the country's load. Market design differs sharply — energy-only ERCOT, capacity-market PJM, bilateral CAISO RA.
Battery storage 101
How grid-scale batteries make money — energy arbitrage, frequency regulation, capacity markets, and the economics of duration.
Retail deregulation
Where you can choose your electricity supplier vs. where you can't — and what deregulation actually delivers for commercial buyers.
Fixed vs. index pricing
When to lock in a fixed price and when to ride the index — the foundational procurement decision every large energy buyer faces.
How the grid stays balanced
Frequency, inertia, AGC, and the reserve products that keep supply matched to demand every second.
EV load & managed charging
How transportation electrification reshapes peak demand, what utility managed charging programs do, and what changed after credits sunset.
Scheduling coordinator (SC)
An entity certified by CAISO to submit schedules, bids, and meter data on behalf of market participants. SCs are the interface between generators, loads, a...
The interconnection queue
More generation in the queue than is installed in the entire US fleet — but only 13% will be built.
Financial transmission right (FTR)
A financial instrument that entitles the holder to a stream of revenue based on congestion charges between two points on the transmission grid. FTRs are us...
Utility efficiency programs
NYSERDA, MassSave, PA Act 129, CA IOU programs — what they fund, how to access them, and how to stack incentives.
Production tax credit (PTC)
A US federal tax credit paid per kilowatt-hour of electricity generated from qualifying renewable sources over a 10-year period. Wind projects have histori...
Power purchase agreement (PPA)
A long-term contract to buy electricity directly from a generator, typically a renewable energy project, at a fixed or indexed price over 10–25 years. Phys...
Spinning reserve
Generation capacity that is already online and synchronized to the grid but not fully loaded — available to ramp up within 10 minutes to respond to a sudde...
Ancillary services
Services that support the reliable operation of the grid beyond energy supply — including frequency regulation, spinning reserves, non-spinning reserves, a...
Combined heat & power
When on-site cogeneration still makes economic sense — spark spreads, the 48 ITC, and the facility profiles where CHP wins.
ISO / RTO
Independent System Operator / Regional Transmission Organization — the entities that manage the electric grid and operate wholesale electricity markets in ...
Virtual power plants
Software-coordinated aggregations of DERs operating as a single dispatchable resource. Now 37.5 GW in North America.
Merit order
The sequence in which power plants are dispatched, ordered from lowest to highest marginal cost of generation, until supply meets demand. Plants at the top...
LCOE
Levelized cost of energy — the average cost per unit of electricity generated over a project's lifetime, accounting for capital costs, operating costs, fue...
Distributed energy resource (DER)
Small-scale power generation or storage resources located close to the point of consumption — including rooftop solar, battery storage, EV chargers, and sm...
Capacity markets
Annual auctions paying generators to stay available. PJM cleared $333/MW-day in the 2027/28 BRA — the first time the entire RTO hit the FERC price cap.
Behind-the-meter storage
Demand charge management, peak shaving, backup power, and how batteries pay back for commercial sites.
Power purchase agreements
Long-term contracts that make clean energy projects financeable — structure, risk allocation, and what buyers need to know.
The duck curve
Why high solar penetration creates a new peak problem — the belly, the neck, and what storage and demand response are doing to solve it.
Investment tax credit (ITC)
A US federal tax credit for clean energy investments equal to a percentage of project cost. Under the Inflation Reduction Act, the base ITC is 30% for sola...
Firm capacity
Generation or transmission capacity that is contractually committed to be available when called upon. Firm capacity commands a premium over non-firm becaus...