Naturally, too, hand-outs of water and electricity bought some support.
By contrast, the price cap for electricity bought in California is usually $250 per megawatt.
This contributed to a significant drop in overall prices for electricity bought wholesale by large consumers.
Kaiser buys most of its electricity under contract from the Bonneville Power Administration, a federal agency, and then tops up with electricity bought on the spot market.
The lifetime costs of a large solar facility are expected to be about 15 percent more than electricity bought from the state's grid.
Because gas is increasingly being used to generate electricity, buying Ruhrgas would also strengthen E.ON's hold on the German power market.
Average recycling rates have more than doubled to 56.6%, and 76.5% of electricity bought by the higher education sector is from renewable sources.
The new municipal bonds, issued by the California Department of Water Resources, are needed to pay for electricity bought during the energy crisis of 2000-2001.
In 2000, he said, the authority spent $296 million more than it had budgeted for the natural gas and oil needed to generate electricity and on electricity bought from outside sources.
Mr. Freeman and other aides to Mr. Davis said that the deals explained why the state, which in January had been paying $275 per megawatt-hour of electricity bought on the spot market, was now paying $121 per megawatt-hour.
Like anyone else hanging on by a thread, she has no need for advice on not leaving her computer on standby, cutting down on red meat, rationing her fuel use, saving electricity, buying recycled clothes and "flying less".
