Public utility

A public utility (usually just utility) is an organization that maintains the infrastructure for a public service (often also providing a service using that infrastructure). Public utilities are subject to forms of public control and regulation ranging from local community-based groups to statewide government monopolies.

The term utilities can also refer to the set of services provided by these organizations consumed by the public: electricity, natural gas, water, and sewage. Broadband internet services (both fixed-line and mobile) are increasingly being included within the definition.

United States

In the United States, public utilities are often natural monopolies because the infrastructure required to produce and deliver a product such as electricity or water is very expensive to build and maintain. As a result, they are often government monopolies, or if privately owned, the sectors are specially regulated by a public utilities commission. The first public utility in the United States was a grist mill on Mother Brook in Dedham, Massachusetts.

Natural gas

Natural gas is a naturally occurring hydrocarbon gas mixture consisting primarily of methane, but commonly including varying amounts of other higher alkanes, and sometimes a small percentage of carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and/or hydrogen sulfide. It is formed when layers of decomposing plant and animal matter are exposed to intense heat and pressure supplied by existing under the surface over millions of years. The energy that the plants originally obtained from the sun is stored in the form of chemical bonds in the gas.

Natural gas is a fossil fuel used as a source of energy for heating, cooking, and electricity generation. It is also used as fuel for vehicles and as a chemical feedstock in the manufacture of plastics and other commercially important organic chemicals. It is a non-renewable resource.

Natural gas is found in deep underground rock formations or associated with other hydrocarbon reservoirs in coal beds and as methane clathrates. Petroleum is another resource and fossil fuel found in close proximity to, and with natural gas. Most natural gas was created over time by two mechanisms: biogenic and thermogenic. Biogenic gas is created by methanogenic organisms in marshes, bogs, landfills, and shallow sediments. Deeper in the earth, at greater temperature and pressure, thermogenic gas is created from buried organic material.

Natural gas (disambiguation)

Natural Gas may refer to:

Natural Gas (band)

Natural Gas were an English rock band featuring Peter Wood, Joey Molland, Mark Clarke and Jerry Shirley. They released one album, Natural Gas, produced by Felix Pappalardi, in 1976.

Discography

Singles

Albums

(Joey Molland: guitar, vocals, Mark Clarke: bass, vocals, Peter Wood: keyboards, Jerry Shirley: drums)

"Little Darlin'" (Molland, Molland)

"Once Again (A Love Song)" (Molland)

"You Can Do It" (Clarke, Wood)

"I've Been Waitin'" (Molland)

"I Believe It's Love" (Molland, Shirley)

"Right Time" (Clarke)

"Christmas Song" (Molland)

"Miracle Mile" (Clarke)

"Dark Cloud" (Molland)

"St. Louis Blues (Clarke)

References