Public utilities provide electric, gas, water or telephone service to customers in a specified area. Utilities have a duty to provide safe and adequate service on reasonable terms to anyone who lives within the service area on without discriminating between customers. Because most utilities operate in near monopolistic conditions, they can be heavily regulated by local, state, and federal authorities. Generally, the local and state agencies are called Public Service Commissions (PSC) or Public Utility Commissions (PUC). Municipal Utilities and Rural Electric Cooperatives may be unregulated though.
Captain Cook is a census-designated place (CDP) in Hawaiʻi County, Hawaiʻi, in the United States. As of the 2000 census, the CDP population was 3,206. The community, which is actually located in the land division of Kealakekua, is so named because the post office for the area was located in the Captain Cook Coffee Co. during the early 1900s.