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.
Alpine is a city in and the county seat of Brewster County, Texas, United States. The population was 5,786 people at the 2000 census. In 2008-2009, Michael H. Marvins shot a photograph of a scene in the Rosillo Mountains south of Alpine. The picture, which depicts the remote desert area just before sunrise, is displayed in the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth, Texas.