Carnegie Mellon Electricity Industry Center

2004-05 Seminars

Wide Open Load Following (WOLF) As Applied to Reactive Power

Mark B. Lively

Abstract
WOLF creates a financial feedback loop using a quantification of the quality of a public good to price a relevant commodity as part of controlling a system and improving its reliability. For reactive power, the public good is local area voltage. A measurement of that voltage is one of the independent variables in the WOLF pricing formula for unscheduled amounts of reactive power. Other independent variables can include the local price for active power. The CMU presentation will include a discussion of the effectiveness of financial feedback loops for improving the quality of public goods as has been demonstrated in India in the pricing of active power and the consequent improvement in the frequency of the electric grid.

Mark Lively is an independent consultant specializing in the design of financial systems involving electricity and natural gas. He has a SB in Electrical Engineer from MIT and a SM in Management from MIT's Sloan School. He worked for American Electric Power Service Corporation in NYC for five years and for Ernst & Ernst (and successors) in its Washington Utility Group for fifteen years. He developed the Committed Unit Basis (CUB) for evaluating long term contracts between utilities and Qualifying Facilities such as cogenerators. He has testified before several state commissions and has had consulting assignments in South Africa, Australia, Kazakhstan, and Oman.

Slides