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Citing the need to chart the state's energy future, Gov. Martin O'Malley on Friday signed an executive order calling for the Department of Natural Resources to deliver a long-term electricity report by December 2011.

The report, the first of its kind in 20 years, will evaluate the state's electricity needs and will review alternative resources available to meet those needs over the next two decades.

No major new electric power plants or transmission lines have been built in Maryland since the last such analysis was done in 1990, O'Malley (D) said in a statement. Meanwhile, wind and solar power have evolved into more marketable energy alternatives, and a third nuclear reactor is proposed for Calvert Cliffs.

"This report will provide data critical to addressing our long-term electricity needs, a major component of our blueprint for securing a clean, reliable and affordable energy future for Maryland families," O'Malley said in a news release.

Maryland's population has grown by about 1 million since 1990, increasing electricity consumption by 25 percent. The population is expected to grow by another million by 2030.

The General Assembly's decision in 1999 to deregulate Maryland utilities also has altered the state's energy landscape. In 2009, the legislature, at O'Malley's urging, took up the possibility of re-regulating the markets, sparking a debate that remains unresolved.

"When we've had debates about re-regulation, deregulation, it all comes down to competition," said Del. Brian J. Feldman (D-Dist. 15) of Potomac, a member of the House Economic Matters Committee. In 2009, the committee blocked a Senate-backed re-regulation plan.

While alternative electricity providers try to crack the market, some large businesses are reporting cost savings.

But smaller business and residential customers have yet to see widespread savings, and O'Malley has crusaded against Constellation Energy Group, the parent company of Baltimore Gas & Electric, in hopes of holding down rising electricity rates.

The report will consider how fossil fuels, nuclear power, renewable electric generation resources, energy conservation and efficiency measures, improvements to the electricity grid and measures designed to reduce peak demand will affect the state's needs, Malcolm Woolf, director of the Maryland Energy Administration, said in the release.

It also will examine how electric vehicles and "smart meters" that will help consumers better manage their energy use will affect electricity supply and demand, Woolf said.

The importance of another focus of the report — the reliability of electric service — was highlighted by the widespread power outages experienced in the Washington, D.C., suburbs this week, Feldman said.

The latest outages, and outages caused by snowstorms earlier this year, knocked out electric service to homes and businesses for more than 24 hours in some cases.

"For a lot of people, reliability is as important, if not more important, than the rates that we pay," Feldman said.

O'Malley's order calls for DNR to write the report with input from other cabinet departments, consumer groups, energy companies and environmental interests.

To read the executive order, go to www.governor.maryland.gov/documents/ElectricityEO.pdf.