Now that you have read about how electricity and natural gas prices are affected and formed, it's time to use your knowledge. You'll use an Electricity Calculator to do that.

What you will find out is that electricity prices and environmental quality are strongly related. In other words, electricity production by fossil fuels like coal, biomass (wood waste), petroleum and natural gas (relatively clean compared to coal) produces carbon in the form of carbon dioxide. In contrast, nuclear power plants produce no carbon or green house gases.

You'll see what we mean when you play around with the calculator. You'll try to keep electricity prices down and at the same time control or limit air pollution by selecting a portfolio of power generating plants and conservation measures. You'll soon realize that this is no easy task.

Unfortunately, we could not find an electricity calculator for the United States. Until we do, you can practice being an Energy Czar using the Electricity Calculator for the United Kingdom that we found on BBC Online. We think its pretty cool. Click the box below and then click start.