ORFIN: An electric utility financial and production simulator

With the coming changes in the electrical industry, there is a broad need to understand the impacts of restructuring on customers, existing utilities, and other stakeholders. Retail wheeling; performance-based regulation; unbundling of generation, transmission, and distribution; and the impact of stranded commitments are all key issues in the discussions of the future of the industry. To quantify these issues, financial and production cost models are required. The authors have created a smaller and faster finance and operations model call the Oak Ridge Financial Model (ORFIN) to help analyze the ramifications of the issues identified above. It combines detailed pricing and financial analysis with an economic dispatch model over a multi-year period. Several types of ratemaking are modeled, as well as the wholesale market and retail wheeling. Multiple plants and purchased power contracts are modeled for economic dispatch, and separate financial accounts are kept for each. Transmission, distribution, and other functions are also broken out. Regulatory assets such as deferred tax credits and demand-side management (DSM) programs are also included in the income statement and balance sheet. This report describes some of the key features of the model. Examples of the financial reports are shown, with a description of their formulation. Some of the ways these results can be used in analyzing various issues are provided.