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34-520: As of 2007, Otter Tail Power Company serves at least 423 towns at retail and delivers power to about 14 municipal utilities. The company currently has a workforce of over 750 employees, a generating capacity of 660 megawatts , and owns over 5,000 miles (8,000 km) of electrical power transmission lines (the majority of which are operated at 41.6 kV). The company serves 128,500 customers in North Dakota , Minnesota , and South Dakota . The company

68-558: A light bulb with a power rating of 100 W is turned on for one hour, the energy used is 100 watt hours (W·h), 0.1 kilowatt hour, or 360  kJ . This same amount of energy would light a 40-watt bulb for 2.5 hours, or a 50-watt bulb for 2 hours. Power stations are rated using units of power, typically megawatts or gigawatts (for example, the Three Gorges Dam in China is rated at approximately 22 gigawatts). This reflects

102-447: A period of one year: equivalent to approximately 114 megawatts of constant power output. The watt-second is a unit of energy, equal to the joule . One kilowatt hour is 3,600,000 watt seconds. While a watt per hour is a unit of rate of change of power with time, it is not correct to refer to a watt (or watt-hour) as a watt per hour. Mausoleum of Theodoric The Mausoleum of Theodoric ( Italian : Mausoleo di Teodorico )

136-441: A room that was probably a chapel for funeral liturgies ; an external stair leads to the upper floor. Located in the centre of the upper floor is a fragmentary ancient Roman porphyry tub, likely from a bath complex, in which Theodoric was buried. His remains were removed during Byzantine rule, when the mausoleum was turned into a Christian oratory . In the late 19th century, silting from a nearby rivulet that had partly submerged

170-541: A turbine, which generates 648 MW e (i.e. electricity). Other SI prefixes are sometimes used, for example gigawatt electrical (GW e ). The International Bureau of Weights and Measures , which maintains the SI-standard, states that further information about a quantity should not be attached to the unit symbol but instead to the quantity symbol (e.g., P th = 270 W rather than P = 270 W th ) and so these unit symbols are non-SI. In compliance with SI,

204-495: A unit of time, namely 1 J/s. In this new definition, 1 absolute watt = 1.00019 international watts. Texts written before 1948 are likely to be using the international watt, which implies caution when comparing numerical values from this period with the post-1948 watt. In 1960, the 11th General Conference on Weights and Measures adopted the absolute watt into the International System of Units (SI) as

238-630: Is also seeking to withdraw from its investment in the Coyote plant in western North Dakota. Otter Tail Power Company currently owns 138 MW of wind generation, and purchases an additional 45 MW for a total of 183 MW of wind power . By 2010 wind generation on the system was expected to be equivalent to 18 percent of retail sales. Owned wind resources and power purchase agreements for Otter Tail Power Company include: Luverne Wind Farm, Ashtabula Wind Energy Center, Langdon Wind Energy Center, and North Dakota Wind II. Megawatts The watt (symbol: W )

272-648: Is an ancient monument just outside Ravenna , Italy . It was built in AD 520 by Theodoric the Great , king of the Ostrogoths , as his future tomb. The mausoleum's current structure consists of two decagonal orders, one above the other made of Istrian stone , sourced from a quarry approximately 400 kilometres (249 mi) away by land journey. The mausoleum's roof consists of a single carved stone 10 metres (33 ft) in diameter weighing 230 tonnes. A niche leads down to

306-733: Is named after the Scottish inventor James Watt . The unit name was proposed by C. William Siemens in August 1882 in his President's Address to the Fifty-Second Congress of the British Association for the Advancement of Science . Noting that units in the practical system of units were named after leading physicists, Siemens proposed that watt might be an appropriate name for a unit of power. Siemens defined

340-523: Is the rate at which electrical work is performed when a current of one ampere (A) flows across an electrical potential difference of one volt (V), meaning the watt is equivalent to the volt-ampere (the latter unit, however, is used for a different quantity from the real power of an electrical circuit). 1   W = 1   V ⋅ A . {\displaystyle \mathrm {1~W=1~V{\cdot }A} .} Two additional unit conversions for watt can be found using

374-472: Is the unit of power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m ⋅s . It is used to quantify the rate of energy transfer . The watt is named in honor of James Watt (1736–1819), an 18th-century Scottish inventor , mechanical engineer , and chemist who improved the Newcomen engine with his own steam engine in 1776. Watt's invention

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408-564: Is unique in that the dam also formed the water intake for the coal-fired power plant that once stood nearby. Taplin Gorge's powerhouse is unique in that it was modeled after the Mausoleum of Theodoric at Ravenna, Italy. The company has since removed the Bemidji dam from its generation fleet (due to an equipment failure) but continues to operate the dam to regulate water levels on the lake behind

442-448: The 34.5 kV transmission line serving these towns approached its load limit. A merger with Montana-Dakota Utilities was briefly explored in the late 1960s but was soon dropped due to all the regulatory hurdles involved. By the 1990s, flat revenues from the utility operations led the company to establish a subsidiary (Varistar) to acquire and oversee non-utility businesses. In 2001, the company changed its name to Otter Tail Corporation with

476-470: The above equation and Ohm's law . 1   W = 1   V 2 / Ω = 1   A 2 ⋅ Ω , {\displaystyle \mathrm {1~W=1~V^{2}/\Omega =1~A^{2}{\cdot }\Omega } ,} where ohm ( Ω {\displaystyle \Omega } ) is the SI derived unit of electrical resistance . The watt

510-470: The bulk of the company's power needs from then on). The company has grown to such a point that today only about 1% of the company's needs still comes from hydropower. The dams are: Dayton Hollow (1909 - southwest of Fergus Falls), Hoot Lake (1914 / 1918 - east Fergus Falls), Pisgah (1918 - west Fergus Falls), Wright (rebuilt 1922 - downtown Fergus Falls), Taplin Gorge (1925 - northeast of Fergus Falls), and Bemidji (built early 1900s / purchased in 1944). Hoot Lake

544-530: The cities of Breckenridge and Fergus Falls, MN (the latter after their own municipal utility's dam failed). After connecting Foxhome , MN, to the system in 1912, the company connected or purchased electric distribution systems in 10 Minnesota towns (the most prominent being Elbow Lake and Morris, MN) and a second town in North Dakota (Fairmount) the following year. Northern Light Electric also merged with Otter Tail at this time and its owner came on board as

578-458: The company's early plants and the last that was 100% owned by the company. The plant began as an extension of the Hoot Lake hydro plant, with six additions built between 1921 and 1964. At the time of its retirement and demolition in 2021 (as part of Minnesota's commitment to carbon-free sources of energy), only the two most recent units (built in 1959 and 1964) were still in operation. The company

612-515: The company's first general manager. The first South Dakota community served by the company was White Rock in 1915. By 1920, the company was serving approximately 44 towns, all but a handful of which were in or near Otter Tail County. However, the company quickly found its Minnesota service area hemmed in by neighboring utility companies that were also rushing to add territory. This led to the company expanding westward into and across much of eastern North Dakota, reaching Jamestown, ND by 1924 (the company

646-441: The dam and the river downstream. After the company's load exceeded the capacity of its dams, the company then switched to coal to meet its energy requirements. A number of plants were added to its system in the 1920s, starting with Hoot Lake in 1921. The most important one was built near Washburn, ND in 1926, as it was one of the earliest large-scale plants to burn lignite exclusively. The company then added several more plants across

680-515: The energy company Ørsted A/S uses the unit megawatt for produced electrical power and the equivalent unit megajoule per second for delivered heating power in a combined heat and power station such as Avedøre Power Station . When describing alternating current (AC) electricity, another distinction is made between the watt and the volt-ampere . While these units are equivalent for simple resistive circuits , they differ when loads exhibit electrical reactance . Radio stations usually report

714-677: The mausoleum was drained and excavated. It was inscribed with seven other "Early Christian Monuments and Mosaics of Ravenna" buildings as one of the UNESCO World Heritage Sites in 1996. According to the ICOMOS evaluation, "the significance of the mausoleum lies in its Gothic style and decoration, which owe nothing to Roman or Byzantine art, although it makes use of the Roman stone construction technique of opus quadratum , which had been abandoned four centuries before" and in

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748-460: The maximum power output it can achieve at any point in time. A power station's annual energy output, however, would be recorded using units of energy (not power), typically gigawatt hours. Major energy production or consumption is often expressed as terawatt hours for a given period; often a calendar year or financial year. One terawatt hour of energy is equal to a sustained power delivery of one terawatt for one hour, or approximately 114 megawatts for

782-464: The number of towns served within the region would shrink (mainly due to towns served at wholesale changing suppliers and some smaller retail towns dying out). A few towns were added between 1944 and 1968—the largest being the purchase of Fergus Falls' municipal utility in 1953 and the last addition being the transfer of several towns in Polk County, Minnesota , from Northern States Power Company when

816-488: The power of their transmitters in units of watts, referring to the effective radiated power . This refers to the power that a half-wave dipole antenna would need to radiate to match the intensity of the transmitter's main lobe . The terms power and energy are closely related but distinct physical quantities. Power is the rate at which energy is generated or consumed and hence is measured in units (e.g. watts) that represent energy per unit time . For example, when

850-489: The same size as the state of Wisconsin . The one exception in this territory is the Red River Valley between Grand Forks and Fargo, ND, which was then and still is served by Northern States Power Company (now Xcel Energy ). After the final major acquisition in 1944, the company had reached its 'maximum system' of 496 towns served at both retail and wholesale. As the company matured over the next several decades,

884-460: The system in the late 1940s to meet the huge surge in demand after WWII, but when the company's Big Stone plant was completed in 1974, all of these smaller plants were retired and removed (the Washburn plant had been removed in 1969). The company completed its Coyote plant in 1981, after which another of the company's earlier plants (at Ortonville, MN) was removed. The Hoot Lake plant was the last of

918-569: The unit of power. In the electric power industry , megawatt electrical ( MWe or MW e ) refers by convention to the electric power produced by a generator, while megawatt thermal or thermal megawatt (MWt, MW t , or MWth, MW th ) refers to thermal power produced by the plant. For example, the Embalse nuclear power plant in Argentina uses a fission reactor to generate 2,109 MW t (i.e. heat), which creates steam to drive

952-570: The unit within the existing system of practical units as "the power conveyed by a current of an Ampère through the difference of potential of a Volt". In October 1908, at the International Conference on Electric Units and Standards in London, so-called international definitions were established for practical electrical units. Siemens' definition was adopted as the international watt. (Also used: 1 A × 1 Ω.) The watt

986-484: The utility becoming a division within the company. In late 2008, the company completed a reorganization to realign the utility operations into a subsidiary within Otter Tail Corporation. In the beginning, Otter Tail Power built a series of hydroelectric plants to provide power for its system and these served the company well until its expansion in the 1920s outstripped the dams' capacity (steam provided

1020-420: Was defined as equal to 10 units of power in the practical system of units. The "international units" were dominant from 1909 until 1948. After the 9th General Conference on Weights and Measures in 1948, the international watt was redefined from practical units to absolute units (i.e., using only length, mass, and time). Concretely, this meant that 1 watt was defined as the quantity of energy transferred in

1054-694: Was fundamental for the Industrial Revolution . When an object's velocity is held constant at one meter per second against a constant opposing force of one newton , the rate at which work is done is one watt. 1   W = 1   J / s = 1   N ⋅ m / s = 1   k g ⋅ m 2 ⋅ s − 3 . {\displaystyle \mathrm {1~W=1~J{/}s=1~N{\cdot }m{/}s=1~kg{\cdot }m^{2}{\cdot }s^{-3}} .} In terms of electromagnetism , one watt

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1088-612: Was incorporated in 1907 when funds were secured to begin construction of the Dayton Hollow Dam southwest of Fergus Falls. Once the dam came online in April 1909, the company transmitted power at 22 kV over a 25-mile (40 km) line to serve the customers of the Northern Light Electric Company at Wahpeton , North Dakota . Shortly thereafter, contracts were secured to provide power at wholesale to

1122-582: Was serving over 100 towns by this time). The company grew at an incredible rate over the next 5 years—reaching the Missouri River at Washburn in 1926 and approaching the Canada–US border by 1928. By the end of the 1920s, the company's service area had tripled to serve more than 310 towns. During the Great Depression , the company was apparently not as badly affected as some of its neighbors but

1156-627: Was still forced to focus more on survival than growth. By 1939, the worst was past, and they were ready to move forward once more. Between 1940 and 1944, Otter Tail added territory by merger or acquisition of 6 smaller power companies within or adjacent to its territory (almost all of who had corporate parents that were required to divest these properties due to passage of the Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935 ). These purchases increased its territory to its present size of 50,000 square miles (130,000 km), about

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