News/Analysis

Question 1

What is FiT?

Answer 1

Feed in tariff - A feed-in tariff (FIT, FiT, standard offer contract, advanced renewable tariff, or renewable energy payments) is a policy mechanism designed to accelerate investment in renewable energy technologies by offering long-term contracts to renewable energy producers. Their goal is to offer cost-based compensation to renewable energy producers, providing price certainty and long-term contracts that help finance renewable energy investments.

Question 2

What is FiP?

Answer 2

Feed in premium- A type of feed-in policy, where producers of electricity from renewable sources sell electricity at market prices, and a premium is added to the market price to compensate for higher costs and thus to mitigate financial risks of renewables production

Question 3

a megawatt

Answer 3

is one million watts

Question 4

a kilowatt

Answer 4

is one thousand watts

Question 5

what is the yardstick for measuring electricty?

Answer 5

watts

Question 6

a hundred watt lightbulb….

Answer 6

consumes 100 watts of power when turned on

Question 7

if an 100 watt lightbulb was turned on for 4 hours

Answer 7

it would consume 400 Wh of energy (watt hours)

Question 8

watts measure….

Answer 8

instantaneous power

Question 9

watt hours measure….

Answer 9

total energy consumed over a period of time

Question 10

a 100MW rated wind farm is capable of producing?

Answer 10

100MW during peak winds. It depends on wind though.

Question 11

why would a power plant produce less than it can?

Answer 11

shut down for maintenance, strikes, and if other plants can produce power less expensively

Question 12

what is the capacity factor?

Answer 12

the ratio of a power plants average production to its rated capability

Question 13

what is the capacity factor of a 100MW capability that produces 30MW?

Answer 13

30pc (30MW/100MW)

Question 14

what is load factor?

Answer 14

divide the average load by peak load over a certain period of time

Question 15

If the residential load at a utility averaged 5,000 MW over the course of a year and the peak
load was 10,000 MW….

Answer 15

residential customers would have a load factor of 50

percent (5,000 MW average divided by 10,000 MW peak).

Question 16

Who have high and low load factors?

Answer 16

Residential homes tend to have low load factors because people are home and using appliances only during certain hours of the day, while certain industrial customer will have very high load factors because they operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week

Question 17

How do you work out what a plant produces?

Answer 17

knowing the plant’s

rating (capability) and capacity factor

Question 18

What are very important aspects to knowing what a MW of generation capacity is worth in terms of how many equivalent homes it represents?

Answer 18

The first factor is how much electricity the power plant itself produces, which can be calculated by knowing the plant’s rating and capacity factor. Second, the location of the plant is very important as the amount of
electricity consumed in a typical household can vary dramatically across the country.