User:Akasha Colony/Sandbox

Net electricity generation by energy source in 2017.

  Nuclear (52.8%)

  Hydro (20.4%)

  Natural gas (10.3%)

  Coal (5.5%)

  Wind (5.3%)

  Solar (3.8%)

  Other (1.9%)

The electricity sector of Carthage is comprised of a mixture of public and private organizations regulated by the Carthage National Electricity Board and local public utilities commissions. While most generation and all transmission facilities are state-owned, distribution services are provided by a mixture of publicly-owned utilities, cooperatives, and investor-owned utilities operating at a local level. Distribution utilities may also operate their own generation facilities, although the vast majority are distribution-only and rely on electricity purchased through the electricity market.

In 2018, there were 4,320 public power utilities, 244 cooperatives, and 404 investor-owned utilities in Carthage delivering a total of 33,568 TWh to over 5.6 billion customers. The primary sources of electricity were nuclear (52.8%), hydropower (20.4%), natural gas (10.3%), coal (5.5%), and mixed renewables (10%). Over the past two decades the largest increases in electrical generation came from renewables and nuclear power with sharp reductions in generation from fossil fuels for an overall slight decline in electricity generation. The average electricity tariff in 2016 was 15.4 cents/kilowatt-hour (kWh), in line with the expected range for developed nations. The average per-capita consumption of electricity in 2016 was 16 kWh/day, also within the standard range for developed nations.

At the beginning of Carthage's industrialization in the late 1800s, Carthage suffered from higher-than-average electricity prices due to shortages of exploitable energy resources and a reliance on imported coal. By the 1920s, increased exploitation of abundant hydropower resources began lowering retail prices although increasing industrialization kept prices above average for developed nations. In the 1960s the Carthaginian government began funding substantial development of nuclear power as the eventual primary source of electricity with the goal of lowering rates and reducing reliance on foreign energy in favor of locally-extracted uranium. Since then electricity rates have fallen into parity with other developed nations and energy imports have declined by over 80%.

Since the approval of the 2020 Strategic Electricity Initiative by the Department of Science, Energy, and Technology, the government has pursued several major objectives in further developing the electricity sector: eliminating remaining energy imports, improving energy efficiency among consumers and producers, increasing the share of electricity generated from renewable sources, and further improving grid reliability and redundancy.

Generation

Nuclear power

As of 2017 there are 1,879 commercial reactors in Carthage generating approximately 53% of the nation's total electric energy consumption, by far the largest share of the electricity market. The majority of these plants (over 1,100) are owned and operated by the Carthage Nuclear Electric Corporation (CNEC), a state-owned utility established in the 1950s as the Carthage Nuclear Energy Agency (CNEA) to promote and develop nuclear energy as a reliable source of independent energy. The remaining plants are owned by independent utilities, although many plant owners contract the operation of their facilities to CNEC.

Domination of the nuclear power industry by CNEC has resulted in the consolidation of the industry on a handful of reactor designs selected by CNEC for mass production, including both pressurized water reactors and boiling water reactors, though PWRs make up the majority of reactors in service. As of 2017, all Generation I reactors have been retired and the majority of commercial reactors are Generation II or II+ designs, with Generation III reactors entering service since the late 1990s.

The Carthage nuclear industry reprocesses its nuclear waste to extract plutonium and uranium for use as additional fuel in order to reduce raw uranium consumption. As a result, several standard reactor designs are capable of burning partial MOX fuel loads.

Fossil fuels

Fossil fuels have historically contributed a smaller share of Carthage's electrical production than in other developed countries owing to a shortage of easily-exploitable coal reserves. The first commercial generating station using coal as fuel entered service in Lagos in 1896 but expansion of the network proved challenging. By the 1930s, most of the coal-fired generating stations in central Africa had been retired in favor of dams tapping into the region's abundant hydropower potential. The last coal-fired generating station in mainland Carthage shut down in 2016, though others continue in operation in overseas territories and account for 5.5% of generation in 2017.

The discovery of significant oil reserves in the 1920s led to the development of a significant natural gas electric infrastructure. Natural gas became the largest non-hydropower source of electricity in Carthage until nuclear power overtook it in the 1960s and still accounted for over 10% of generation in 2017.

Petroleum-fired generating stations account for less than 0.5% of Carthage's total generation capacity, limited almost entirely to peaking plants. Older plants have been decommissioned in favor of pumped-storage hydroelectric facilities, battery stations, and other load-shifting technologies.

Under the 2020 Strategic Energy Initiative, the government plans to retire the remaining fossil fuel electric infrastructure by 2050 except in certain cases where alternatives may not be readily available.

Transmission

Since 1964 all transmission infrastructure in Carthage have been owned and operated by the Carthage National Grid Corporation (CNGC), a state-owned monopoly with a mandate to provide non-discriminatory access to all customers.

CNGC is responsible for a total of over 1,220,000 kilometers (760,000 mi) of high-voltage transmission lines throughout Carthaginian territory and is divided into six regional authorities. Each unit is responsible for one of Carthage's major wide area synchronous grids which are separated due to geographic distance. The largest synchronous grid by far is the Central Grid which serves the Carthaginian mainland and is responsible for nearly 2/3rds of the electrical consumption in Carthage. Outlying territories and islands too distant for practical connection to a larger synchronous grid are governed by the nearest authority.