Energy Abbreviations
74 abbreviations · part of Science & Engineering Abbreviations
Abbreviations from electricity generation and grids, renewable energy, fuels, batteries, electric vehicles and nuclear power: vehicle types (EV, PHEV, FCEV) and charging standards (CCS, NACS), solar terms (PV, CSP, MPPT), fuels (LNG, LPG, SAF, E85), battery chemistries and metrics (LFP, NMC, SoC), power plant and reactor types (CCGT, PWR, SMR) and electricity market terms (PPA, LCOE, REC). Units such as kWh, MW or BTU are listed with measurement abbreviations.
| Abbreviation | Stands for | Description |
|---|---|---|
| AMI | Advanced metering infrastructure | System of smart meters, communication networks and data management that lets utilities read electricity, gas or water use remotely at frequent intervals and communicate… |
| B20 | Biodiesel blend (20% biodiesel) | Diesel fuel containing 20% biodiesel and 80% petroleum diesel, a common blend for fleets and farm equipment. |
| BESS | Battery energy storage system | Large installation of rechargeable batteries, usually lithium-ion, with inverters and controls, that stores electricity and releases it to the grid or a facility when… |
| BEV | Battery electric vehicle | Vehicle powered solely by a rechargeable battery pack and electric motors, with no gasoline engine. |
| BMS | Battery management system | Electronics that monitor and protect a rechargeable battery pack, measuring cell voltages, currents and temperatures, balancing cells, estimating state of charge and… |
| BWR | Boiling water reactor | Nuclear reactor in which water boils directly in the core, and the steam produced drives the turbines before being condensed and returned. |
| CANDU | Canada Deuterium Uranium | Canadian-designed pressurized heavy-water reactor that uses heavy water as moderator and coolant, allowing it to run on natural, unenriched uranium. |
| CCGT | Combined-cycle gas turbine | Power plant in which a gas turbine generates electricity and its hot exhaust produces steam in a heat-recovery boiler to drive a second, steam turbine. |
| CCS | Combined Charging System | EV charging standard that combines an AC charging plug with two extra large pins for DC fast charging in one connector. |
| CF | Capacity factor | Ratio of a power plant's actual output over a period to the output it would produce running at full rated capacity the entire time, expressed as a percentage. |
| CHP | Combined heat and power | Generating electricity and useful heat from the same fuel at the same time, also called cogeneration. |
| CNG | Compressed natural gas | Natural gas, mainly methane, compressed to around 200-250 bar (roughly 3,000-3,600 psi) and stored in strong cylinders for use as vehicle fuel. |
| CSP | Concentrated solar power | Solar thermal technology that uses mirrors to focus sunlight onto a receiver, heating a fluid to run a steam turbine. |
| DCFC | DC fast charging | High-power charging that supplies direct current straight to an EV's battery, bypassing the car's onboard charger. |
| DER | Distributed energy resource | Small-scale power source or controllable load connected near the point of use, such as rooftop solar, home batteries, EV chargers, small wind turbines, backup… |
| DoD | Depth of discharge | Percentage of a battery's capacity that has been used in a cycle, the complement of state of charge: discharging from 100% to 30% is a 70% DoD. |
| DR | Demand response | Programs that pay or reward electricity customers for reducing or shifting their use when the grid is stressed or prices are high, for example by adjusting thermostats… |
| E10 | Gasoline with up to 10% ethanol | Standard gasoline blend containing up to 10% ethanol, sold at most US gas stations and, since 2021, as standard unleaded in the United Kingdom. |
| E85 | Ethanol fuel blend (up to 85% ethanol) | Fuel blend of gasoline with a high share of ethanol, nominally 85% but in the United States allowed to range from about 51% to 83% depending on season and region. |
| EPR | European Pressurized Reactor | Large third-generation pressurized water reactor design of about 1,600 megawatts developed by Framatome and Siemens, later marketed as the Evolutionary Power Reactor. |
| EROI | Energy return on investment | Ratio of the energy a source delivers over its lifetime to the energy needed to find, extract, build and operate it. |
| EV | Electric vehicle | Vehicle propelled by one or more electric motors using energy stored in batteries or, less often, produced by a fuel cell. |
| EVSE | Electric vehicle supply equipment | Formal term for EV charging equipment, including the charging station, cable, connector and control electronics that safely deliver power from the grid to a vehicle. |
| FCEV | Fuel cell electric vehicle | Electric vehicle that generates its electricity on board in a fuel cell combining hydrogen with oxygen from the air, emitting only water vapor. |
| FiT | Feed-in tariff | Policy that guarantees renewable energy producers, from homeowners with rooftop solar to wind farm owners, a fixed payment per kilowatt-hour fed into the grid, usually… |
| HALEU | High-assay low-enriched uranium | Uranium enriched to between 5% and 20% uranium-235, more than conventional reactor fuel but below the weapons-usable threshold. |
| HEU | Highly enriched uranium | Uranium enriched to 20% or more uranium-235, used in nuclear weapons (typically about 90%), naval propulsion reactors and some research reactors. |
| HEV | Hybrid electric vehicle | Vehicle combining a gasoline engine with an electric motor and small battery that charges from the engine and regenerative braking, with no plug. |
| HHV | Higher heating value | Total heat released when a fuel burns completely, including the heat recovered by condensing the water vapor in the exhaust. |
| HVAC | High-voltage alternating current | Transmission of electricity as alternating current at high voltage, the standard method for most power grids because transformers can easily step voltage up for… |
| HVDC | High-voltage direct current | Electric power transmission using direct current at hundreds of thousands to over a million volts. |
| HVO | Hydrotreated vegetable oil | Renewable diesel made by reacting vegetable oils, used cooking oil or animal fats with hydrogen, producing a fuel chemically similar to fossil diesel. |
| ICE | Internal combustion engine | Engine that burns fuel inside its cylinders or combustion chamber, using the expanding hot gases to drive pistons or a turbine. |
| ISO | Independent system operator | Organization that operates a region's high-voltage power grid and wholesale electricity markets independently of the companies that own generation and lines. |
| ITC | Investment tax credit | Federal credit equal to a percentage of the cost of qualifying business property, in recent decades associated mainly with solar, battery storage and other energy… |
| LCOE | Levelized cost of energy | Average cost per unit of electricity a power source produces over its lifetime, combining construction, financing, fuel, operation and maintenance and dividing by total… |
| LEU | Low-enriched uranium | Uranium in which the share of fissile uranium-235 has been raised above the natural 0.72% but remains below 20%. |
| LFP | Lithium iron phosphate | Lithium-ion battery chemistry with a cathode of LiFePO4, valued for safety, long cycle life and low cost because it uses no nickel or cobalt. |
| Li-ion | Lithium-ion | Rechargeable battery in which lithium ions shuttle between a graphite anode and a metal-oxide or phosphate cathode. |
| LNG | Liquefied natural gas | Natural gas cooled to about -162 °C so it becomes a liquid occupying roughly 1/600 of its gaseous volume, allowing it to be shipped by tanker across oceans. |
| LOCA | Loss-of-coolant accident | Nuclear reactor accident in which a break or leak causes cooling water to escape faster than it can be replaced, risking overheating and damage to the fuel. |
| LPG | Liquefied petroleum gas | Fuel made mainly of propane and butane, which liquefy under modest pressure and are stored in steel cylinders and tanks. |
| LWR | Light-water reactor | Nuclear reactor that uses ordinary water as both coolant and neutron moderator, the category that includes pressurized and boiling water reactors and the large majority… |
| MHEV | Mild hybrid electric vehicle | Hybrid system, usually 48-volt, that uses a small motor-generator to assist the engine, restart it smoothly in stop-start traffic and recover braking energy, but cannot… |
| MOX | Mixed oxide fuel | Nuclear fuel made by blending plutonium oxide, recovered from reprocessed spent fuel or surplus weapons, with uranium oxide. |
| MPGe | Miles per gallon equivalent | An EPA efficiency rating for electric and plug-in vehicles that treats 33.7 kWh of electricity as equal to the energy in one gallon of gasoline. |
| MPPT | Maximum power point tracking | Control technique in solar inverters and charge controllers that continuously adjusts the electrical load on solar panels to extract the most power as sunlight and… |
| MSR | Molten salt reactor | Nuclear reactor that uses molten fluoride or chloride salts as coolant, often with fuel dissolved directly in the salt. |
| NACS | North American Charging Standard | EV charging connector developed by Tesla and opened to other manufacturers in 2022, now standardized as SAE J3400. |
| NCA | Nickel cobalt aluminum (oxide) | Lithium-ion cathode chemistry of nickel, cobalt and aluminum oxides, offering high energy density. |
| NiMH | Nickel-metal hydride | Rechargeable battery chemistry using a nickel oxyhydroxide positive electrode and a hydrogen-absorbing metal alloy negative electrode. |
| NMC | Nickel manganese cobalt (oxide) | Family of lithium-ion cathode chemistries combining nickel, manganese and cobalt, used in many long-range EVs because of high energy density. |
| OCGT | Open-cycle gas turbine | Power plant consisting of a gas turbine alone, without heat recovery, also called a simple-cycle plant. |
| PEM | Proton exchange membrane | Thin polymer membrane that conducts protons but blocks electrons and gases, the heart of PEM fuel cells in hydrogen cars and of PEM electrolyzers that split water into… |
| PHEV | Plug-in hybrid electric vehicle | Hybrid with a larger battery that can be charged from an outlet or charger, allowing typically 20 to 50 miles or more of electric-only driving before the gasoline… |
| PHS | Pumped hydro storage | Energy storage method that pumps water uphill to a reservoir when electricity is plentiful and releases it through turbines when power is needed. |
| PPA | Power purchase agreement | Long-term contract, typically 10 to 25 years, under which a buyer such as a utility or corporation agrees to purchase electricity from a generator at a set price. |
| PTC | Production Tax Credit | US federal tax credit paid per kilowatt-hour of electricity generated by qualifying renewable plants during their first ten years of operation. |
| PV | Photovoltaic | Technology that converts sunlight directly into electricity using semiconductor cells, most commonly made of crystalline silicon. |
| PWR | Pressurized water reactor | Most common type of nuclear power reactor, about two thirds of those operating worldwide. |
| REC | Renewable energy certificate | Tradable certificate representing the environmental attributes of one megawatt-hour of electricity generated from a renewable source. |
| RNG | Renewable natural gas | Pipeline-quality methane produced by upgrading biogas from landfills, dairy farm manure digesters, wastewater plants and food waste. |
| RPS | Renewable portfolio standard | State policy requiring electricity suppliers to obtain a minimum share of their power from renewable sources by set dates, typically verified with renewable energy… |
| RTO | Regional transmission organization | Grid operator that manages transmission and wholesale electricity markets across several states, meeting FERC standards for independence and regional scope. |
| SAF | Sustainable aviation fuel | Jet fuel made from non-fossil sources such as used cooking oil, animal fats, agricultural waste or synthetic fuels from captured CO2 and green hydrogen, designed to cut… |
| SMR | Small modular reactor | Nuclear reactor with an electrical output of up to about 300 megawatts, designed to be built largely in factories and shipped to sites as modules. |
| SoC | State of charge | Amount of energy remaining in a battery, expressed as a percentage of its full capacity; the battery equivalent of a fuel gauge. |
| SOFC | Solid oxide fuel cell | Fuel cell that uses a ceramic electrolyte and operates at high temperatures, roughly 600 to 1,000 °C, to generate electricity from hydrogen, natural gas or biogas. |
| SoH | State of health | Measure of a battery's current condition compared with when it was new, usually expressed as the percentage of original capacity it can still hold. |
| STC | Standard test conditions | Laboratory conditions used to rate solar panels: irradiance of 1,000 watts per square meter, a cell temperature of 25 °C and a light spectrum corresponding to air mass… |
| T&D | Transmission and distribution | Network that carries electricity from power plants to consumers: high-voltage transmission lines move bulk power over long distances, and lower-voltage distribution… |
| TOU | Time-of-use (rate) | Electricity pricing plan in which the price per kilowatt-hour varies by time of day and season, highest during peak demand periods such as late afternoon and evening. |
| V2G | Vehicle-to-grid | Technology that lets an electric vehicle send power from its battery back to the electric grid, helping utilities balance demand at peak times. |
| VPP | Virtual power plant | Network of many distributed energy resources, such as home batteries, EVs, smart thermostats and rooftop solar, coordinated by software to act like a single power… |
More science & engineering abbreviations
- Astronomy & Space Abbreviations (83)
- Biology Abbreviations (75)
- Chemical Element Abbreviations (118)
- Chemistry Abbreviations (106)
- Electronics & Electrical Abbreviations (82)
- Engineering Abbreviations (79)
- Environmental Abbreviations (62)
- Genetics Abbreviations (57)
- Physics Abbreviations (68)
- Psychology Abbreviations (62)