Customer Charges
Customer costs generally vary with the number of customers and include distribution-related investment and related charges that pertain to services, meters, billing, accounting, and information.

Delivery Service
That portion of the billing which applies to the charges for services from the transmission and distribution utility (Bangor Hydro).

Demand Charges
Demand costs (kW) generally are fixed in nature (cost does not vary with output) and pertain to production, transmission, and distribution plant investment and related associated charges that provide power for a customer's instantaneous need. Instantaneous need may be compared to a customer flicking a switch at any time and the utility has built committed capacity to serve that need.

Electricity Supplier
That portion of the billing which applies to the charges for electric energy and capacity from the supplier of your choice.

Energy Charges
Energy costs (kWh) generally are variable in nature (cost will vary with output) and pertain to the length of time production facilities and associated charge provide consistent average power.

kW
The rate at which electric energy is delivered to or by a system expressed in Kilowatts (kW) at a given instant or averaged over any designated period of time (most common time period of measurement is 15 minutes). The primary source of "Demand" is the power consuming equipment of the customers. 1kW = 1,000 Watts

kWh
The basic unit of electrical energy equal to one kilowatt (kW) of power supplied to or taken from an electric circuit steadily for one hour.

Load Factor
The ratio of energy (kWh) supplied to a customer during a number of designated hours (usually a month) divided by the maximum demand and hours in that period. The load factor is used to analyze capacity efficiency for customers. For example, a poor load factor signifies erratic usage on a utility system and as a result this customer would pay a greater percentage of demand charges due to the use of committed capacity to serve the maximum instantaneous need.

LF =             kWh per period          
         kW * 24 hrs * # days in period