a customer retention science tool.

    
     
DHA, inc.  

Doctor Dan, the Econ Man, claims accelerated RPS exports pollution.

Dan's conclusion followed from casting results cited in What's New? in the additional light of laxity observed in enforcement of coal mine safety and electricity generation emissions' abatement at retrofit plants.

Dan's poster board was bordered by arial graphics of baseball parks: caps for California's 5 major league teams were awarded to passersby who could identify a team and field from its arial graphic:

FIGURE 3

Conclusions refuted claims made about base load power production resources, incumbent and challenger utility and customer benefit.

DH&A and Autopilot 2007 Version 3.5 TRUE/FALSE Claim #1: Gas Combined Cycle is an economically feasible base load generation option for California.

FIGURE 4

FALSE. Capacity Factors predicted for California never exceed 43%. They never exceed 39% for the U.S. and parts of Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec, and New Brunswick that export to the lower 48.

DH&A and Autopilot 2007 Version 3.5 TRUE/FALSE Claim #2: California should use the CCGT new generation price as a threshold price for determining economic feasibility for new flash geothermal generation.

FALSE. The nomograph shown above and the attached Geothermal Resources Council 2006 Annual Meeting paper by Dan tell the story. CCGT is not an economically feasible base load generation option, even though CalEnergy/MidAmerica, owner of the Salton Sea geothermal resource base uses the CCGT new generation price as a threshold price for determining economic feasibility. This substitutes base loaded coal imports inframarginally for geothermal.

Further, SB1368 would require that the greenhouse gases emission performance standard not exceed the rate of emissions of greenhouse gases for combined-cycle natural gas, as defined, base load generation.

DH&A and Autopilot 2007 Version 3.5 TRUE/FALSE Claim #3: Coal generation has nothing to do with the answers to 1 and 2, owing to the accelerated RPS and CARB compliance.

FIGURE 5

FIGURE 6

FIGURE 7

FALSE. The accelerated RPS and CARB compliance export California base load generation and pollution to coal plants in the Four Corners, Texas, and other venues and vistas.

DH&A and Autopilot 2007 Version 3.5 TRUE/FALSE Claim #4: CCGT generation is at least as profitable as is coal-fired generation - as the wholesale base load power source for an incumbent household electricity retailer.

FALSE. There is no contest - whether you believe that in America, service differentiation defines competition in markets

FIGURE 8

or, alternatively, that price-conscious consumers contrast incumbent standard offer service with non-aggressive differentiation from other retailers.

FIGURE 9

DH&A and Autopilot 2007 Version 3.5 TRUE/FALSE Claim #5: Owing to efficiencies possible that exceed nameplate, CCGT generation supplying wholesale base load power to a non-incumbent household retailer beats coal-fired when the retailer and customer share a 2-way customer/ESP datacom with appliance management for peak-to-base load shifting.

FIGURE 10

FALSE. Peak generation sources include hydro, CCGT, single cycle gas turbines, and some renewable. The price differential for shifting load from these sources to a natural gas-fired base load source is less than that for shifting load from these sources to coal. Hence, 2-way customer/ESP datacom in California exports pollution to the eastern venues supplying the electricity.

Please tell me what Batting Average is again for the first time!

Batting Average is a survival metric for a non-incumbent electricity services provider. As in baseball, higher is better. In shadowprice.com, higher than the LCOS means your portfolio selection mattered: shadowprice.com solution values are based on cost, quality of service, and market power residing in the expectations and behavior of service providers.

Your portfolio of services stays the same for every series game. The Least-Cost-Of-Service provider’s portfolio varies randomly among 7 or 8 service bundles; however, according to rules you set on the bus stop screen, shadowprice.com also selects random combinations of options from the service bundles selected.

DH&A and Autopilot 2007 Version 3.5 TRUE/FALSE Claim #6: No-frills household retail electricity service gains more customers when the base load generation source is gas combined cycle than when the base load generation source is coal.

FALSE. Under coal, the costs for peak power and service differentiation comprise a larger fraction of customer service price than under CCGT. This makes default or no-frills service more attractive in the relative price terms which matter to customers. This is true when competition is aggressive and price following/mergers behavior focuses on lowest power procurement costs.

FIGURE 11

This is true when competition is aggressive but price following/mergers behavior focuses on target/partner's portfolio dominance.

FIGURE 12

This is true with an incumbent Standard Offer and non-aggressive challengers - where price following/mergers behavior focuses on lowest power procurement costs.

FIGURE 13

This is true with an incumbent Standard Offer and non-aggressive challengers - where price following/mergers behavior focuses on target/partner's portfolio dominance.

FIGURE 14

In an everything-the-same-but-base-load-power-cost regime comparison, the low regime always yields more games of a 90-game series in which no-frills service end-of-year market share exceeds 5% than does the high regime. With one exception, the highest end-of-year market share for no-frills service under the low base load power cost regime exceeds that under the high regime.

Master list of ball parks clockwise from lower left to lower right 1. PETCO Park, San Diego Padres 2. Polo Grounds, New York Giants 3. Great American Ball Park, Cincinnati Reds 4. Camden Yards, Baltimore Orioles 5. Ebbets Field, Brooklyn Dodgers 6. Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles Dodgers 7. Miller Park, Milwaukee Brewers 8. Angel Stadium of Anaheim, Los Angeles Angels 9. Yankee Stadium, New York Yankees 10. Wrigley Field, Chicago White Sox 11. Minute Maid Park, Houston Astros 12. McAfee Coliseum, Oakland Athletics 13. Blue Jays Stadium, Toronto 14. Turner Field, Atlanta Braves 15. Busch Stadium, Saint Louis Cardinals 16. Wrigley Field, Chicago Cubs 17. Tropicana Field, Tampa Bay Devil Rays 18. Bank One Ballpark, Arizona Diamondbacks 19. RFK Stadium, Washington Nationals 20. AT&T Park, San Francisco Giants 21. Jacobs Field, Cleveland Indians 22. Safeco Field, Seattle Mariners 23. Florida Marlins, Dolphin Stadium 24. Shea Stadium, New York Mets 25. Citizens Bank Park, Philadelphia Phillies 26. PNC Park, Pittsburgh Pirates 27. Ameriquest Field, Texas Rangers 28. Fenway Park, Boston Red Sox 29. Coors Field, Colorado Rockies 30. Kauffman Stadium, Kansas City Royals 31. Comerica Park, Detroit Tigers 32. H.H.H. Metrodome, Minnesota Twins

Dan can be reached at danhamblin@shadowprice.com.

 
   
 

DANIEL M. HAMBLIN received his Doctorate in Applied Economics from the State University of New York at Buffalo, where he was awarded three University Fellowships to support his graduate training. He earned Bachelor of Arts degrees in Mathematics and Economics with Honors from the University of Kansas, where he was awarded the Domenico Gagliardo Scholarship as the Outstanding Senior in Economics, the John Ise Scholarship for excellence in Economics, and elected to Pi Mu Epsilon--the National Honorary Mathematics Society. Dan was one of 40 junior faculty selected as post-doctoral program participants, to attend seminars describing recent developments in applied economics, conducted by business and economics faculty at the University of Chicago.

In 1979 and 1980, Dan enhanced the Stock Market Game software, by figuring out how to detect the value of stock splits from When Issued and When Declared prices on the ticker tape, and subsequently and automatically adjust game-player portfolios for the split. He also developed a simple program for discerning blocking factors on the Francis Emory Fitch stock price tape, thus solving a problem that had been a mystery and plague to other institutions trying to use the information. His version of the Stock Market Game was purchased by the Security Industries Association.

Before forming his own business, Dan was projects manager for Battelle Memorial Institute, research scientist and group leader for Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), and an Assistant Professor of Economics at the University of Wisconsin-Parkside. His interest and experience in simulation focuses on energy, technology, and policy issues. He has developed industrial process simulation models for EPRI and GRI, as well as optimizing simulation residential and commercial sector energy forecasting models for ORNL and the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA). Dan has led and conducted risk/benefit assessments of the need for electric power, broadleaf herbicide use, and bt corn; worked on assignment for the BPA Division of Power Forecasting; and developed models for BPA, the U.S. Department of Energy, the Northwest Power Planning Council, Ontario Hydro, EPRI, and GRI. Dan has led and participated in several projects related to technologies for electric power generation -- including micro- and miniturbine distributed generation systems, stationary fuel cell and hybrid systems, natural gas combined cycle and renewable energy systems. With Mike Warwick, in 2005 Dan developed Escalator P - a software tool for managing geothermal bilateral contracts.

Dan Hamblin & Associates, Inc. is in its eighteenth year - engaged in economic consulting, project management, business communications, and modeling and simulation. In addition, Dan offers independent services on a free-lance basis to business firms and institutions needing economic analysis, risk analysis, mathematical programming, systems analysis, and business communications' support.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
   
 
      © 2001-2008 Dan Hamblin & Associates, Inc. All rights reserved.