A Background on Utilities and Maintenance Management

Juan F. Gómez Fernández and Adolfo Crespo Márquez
Additional contact information
Juan F. Gómez Fernández: Universidad de Sevilla
Adolfo Crespo Márquez: Universidad de Sevilla

Chapter Chapter 1 in Maintenance Management in Network Utilities, 2012, pp 3-31 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract The expression “public utility” or “utility”, first used in 1903, is defined by Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate® Dictionary, Eleventh Edition (http://www.merriam-webster.com), as “a business organization performing a public service and subject to special governmental regulation”. In the same manner, the Encyclopædia Britannica (http://www.britannica.com) explains “public utility” as “an enterprise that provides certain classes of services to the public, including common carrier transportation; telephone and telegraph; power, heat, and light; and community facilities for water, sanitation, and similar services”. Therefore, “public utility” could be defined as a business organization that provides, by means of an infrastructure, specific services to the public, subject to special governmental regulation to facilitate coverage according to social criteria. Within this definition, we may find, amongst other types of businesses, airlines, railroads, buses, trucking, canals, ferries, electricity, light, oil, natural gas, heat, water, sanitation, waste collection, or telecommunications companies.

Keywords: Business Process; Knowledge Management; Unify Modelling Language; Service Level Agreement; Public Utility (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:ssrchp:978-1-4471-2757-4_1

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/9781447127574

DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4471-2757-4_1

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Springer Series in Reliability Engineering from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().