Electricity is illuminating, but its generation, transmission, and distribution have long been opaque. This report looks at how the once static utility industry is becoming a dynamic and transformative opportunity for the nation's economic, environmental, and energy future.
An array of technological, competitive, and market forces are changing how the U.S. generates power and the ways that Americans interact with the electric grid. A century-old centralized system is yielding to advanced, distributed-energy generation capabilities -- in which power is produced at or near the place where it is consumed -- that allow the industry to respond to new market opportunities and evolving consumer desires.
The report concludes with an evaluation of the impact of key regulatory and legislative policies on the deployment of industrial energy efficiency technologies in order to help federal policymakers effectively encourage adoption of these systems. The Pew Charitable Trusts commissioned ICF International Inc. to model these policies and found that implementation of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Power Plan and an improved federal investment tax credit could result in a 27 percent increase in adoption by 2030.
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