In software quality assurance, performance testing is in general a testing practice performed to determine how a system performs in terms of responsiveness and stability under a particular workload. It can also serve to investigate, measure, validate or verify other quality attributes of the system, such as scalability, reliability and resource usage.
The kilowatt-hour is a unit of energy equal to one kilowatt of power sustained for one hour and is commonly used as a measure of electrical energy.
Distributed generation, also distributed energy, on-site generation (OSG), or district/decentralized energy, is electrical generation and storage performed by a variety of small, grid-connected or distribution system-connected devices referred to as distributed energy resources (DER).
An electricity meter, electric meter, electrical meter, energy meter, or kilowatt-hour meter is a device that measures the amount of electric energy consumed by a residence, a business, or an electrically powered device.
Grid energy storage is a collection of methods used for energy storage on a large scale within an electrical power grid. Electrical energy is stored during times when electricity is plentiful and inexpensive or when demand is low, and later returned to the grid when demand is high, and electricity prices tend to be higher.
Electric power quality is the degree to which the voltage, frequency, and waveform of a power supply system conform to established specifications. Good power quality can be defined as a steady supply voltage that stays within the prescribed range, steady a.c. frequency close to the rated value, and smooth voltage curve waveform. In general, it is useful to consider power quality as the compatibility between what comes out of an electric outlet and the load that is plugged into it. The term is used to describe electric power that drives an electrical load and the load's ability to function properly. Without the proper power, an electrical device may malfunction, fail prematurely or not operate at all. There are many ways in which electric power can be of poor quality and many more causes of such poor quality power.
Peaking power plants, also known as peaker plants, and occasionally just "peakers", are power plants that generally run only when there is a high demand, known as peak demand, for electricity. Because they supply power only occasionally, the power supplied commands a much higher price per kilowatt hour than base load power. Peak load power plants are dispatched in combination with base load power plants, which supply a dependable and consistent amount of electricity, to meet the minimum demand.
Demand response is a change in the power consumption of an electric utility customer to better match the demand for power with the supply. Until recentlyrecently electric energy could not be easily stored, so utilities have traditionally matched demand and supply by throttling the production rate of their power plants, taking generating units on or off line, or importing power from other utilities. There are limits to what can be achieved on the supply side, because some generating units can take a long time to come up to full power, some units may be very expensive to operate, and demand can at times be greater than the capacity of all the available power plants put together. Demand response seeks to adjust the demand for power instead of adjusting the supply.
In electrical engineering, a load profile is a graph of the variation in the electrical load versus time. A load profile will vary according to customer type, temperature and holiday seasons. Power producers use this information to plan how much electricity they will need to make available at any given time. Teletraffic engineering uses a similar load curve.
A load-following power plant, regarded as producing mid-merit or mid-priced electricity, is a power plant that adjusts its power output as demand for electricity fluctuates throughout the day. Load-following plants are typically in between base load and peaking power plants in efficiency, speed of start-up and shut-down, construction cost, cost of electricity and capacity factor.
Natural gas is a commodity that can be stored for an indefinite period of time in natural gas storage facilities for later consumption.
The Energy Exchange Austria (EXAA) is a Central European energy exchange headquartered in Vienna. Currently, the EXAA Market encompasses trading areas in the entire of Austria and Germany.
Electrical power system simulation involves power system modeling and network simulation in order to analyze electrical power systems using design/offline or real-time data. Power system simulation software's are a class of computer simulation programs that focus on the operation of electrical power systems. These types of computer programs are used in a wide range of planning and operational situations for electric power systems.
Load management, also known as demand-side management (DSM), is the process of balancing the supply of electricity on the network with the electrical load by adjusting or controlling the load rather than the power station output. This can be achieved by direct intervention of the utility in real time, by the use of frequency sensitive relays triggering the circuit breakers, by time clocks, or by using special tariffs to influence consumer behavior. Load management allows utilities to reduce demand for electricity during peak usage times, which can, in turn, reduce costs by eliminating the need for peaking power plants. In addition, some peaking power plants can take more than an hour to bring on-line which makes load management even more critical should a plant go off-line unexpectedly for example. Load management can also help reduce harmful emissions, since peaking plants or backup generators are often dirtier and less efficient than base load power plants. New load-management technologies are constantly under development — both by private industry and public entities.
Availability Based Tariff (ABT) is a frequency based pricing mechanism applicable in India for unscheduled electric power transactions. The ABT falls under electricity market mechanisms to charge and regulate power to achieve short term and long term network stability as well as incentives and dis-incentives to grid participants against deviations in committed supplies as the case may be.
In electrical engineering the load factor is defined as the average load divided by the peak load in a specified time period. It is a measure of the utilization rate, or efficiency of electrical energy usage; a high load factor indicates that load is using the electric system more efficiently, whereas consumers or generators that underutilize the electric distribution will have a low load factor.
The military standard referred to as MIL-E-7016F, Electric Load and Power Source Capacity, Aircraft, Analysis of" addresses the methods and analysis of electric loads and source capacity on military aircraft. The use of the document is approved for use by all departments and agencies of the United States Department of Defense (DoD). Although prepared specifically for DoD applications, the standard may be tailored for commercial applications as well.
In the recent years, utilization of electrical energy increased exponentially and customer requirement and quality definitions of power were changed enormously. As the electric energy became an essential part of the daily life, its optimal usage and reliability became important. Real-time network view and dynamic decisions have become instrumental for optimizing resources and managing demands, thus making a distribution management system which could handle proper work flows, very critical.
The duck curve is a graph of power production over the course of a day that shows the timing imbalance between peak demand and renewable energy production. Used in utility-scale electricity generation, the term was coined in 2012 by Karen Edson of the California Independent System Operator.
