Wisconsin

Wisconsin (ⁱ/wɪsˈkɒ̃nsɪn/) is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States, in the Midwest and Great Lakes regions. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin is the 23rd largest state by total area and the 20th most populous. The state capital is Madison, and its largest city is Milwaukee, which is located on the western shore of Lake Michigan. The state is divided into 72 counties.

Wisconsin's geography is diverse, with the Northern Highland and Western Upland along with a part of the Central Plain occupying the western part of the state and lowlands stretching to the shore of Lake Michigan. Wisconsin is second to Michigan in the length of its Great Lakes coastline.

Wisconsin is known as "America's Dairyland" because it is one of the nation's leading dairy producers, particularly famous for cheese. Manufacturing, especially paper products, information technology (IT), and tourism are also major contributors to the state's economy.

Public service

Public service is a service which is provided by government to people living within its jurisdiction, either directly (through the public sector) or by financing provision of services. The term is associated with a social consensus (usually expressed through democratic elections) that certain services should be available to all, regardless of income. Even where public services are neither publicly provided nor publicly financed, for social and political reasons they are usually subject to regulation going beyond that applying to most economic sectors. Public policy when made in the public's interest and motivations can provide Public services. Public service is also a course that can be studied at a college and/or university. Examples of public services are the fire brigade, police, army, and paramedics.

Sectors

Public services are seen as so important that for moral reasons their universal provision should be guaranteed. They may be associated with fundamental human rights (such as the right to water). The Volunteer Fire Dept. and Ambulance Corps. are institutions with the mission of servicing the community. A service is helping others with a specific need or want. Here, service ranges from a doctor curing an illness, to a repair person, to a food pantry.

Wisconsin Public Service Corporation

Wisconsin Public Service Corporation (WPS) is a utility company headquartered in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The company serves more than 440,000 electric customers and more than 315,000 natural gas customers in 27 counties in eastern, northeastern northern, and central Wisconsin, and a small portion of Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

WPS began in 1883 as the Oshkosh Gas Light Company. It was incorporated as Wisconsin Public Service in 1922. And it was first listed on the New York and Midwest stock exchanges in 1953. In 1994, WPS became a subsidiary of WPS Resources Corporation, an energy holding company. In February 2007, WPS Resources Corporation became Integrys Energy Group. A detailed history of the company can be found at .

WPS owns two coal, and one natural gas power generation plants. It also owns 15 hydroelectric power plants on the Wisconsin, Tomahawk, Peshtigo and Menominee rivers, and a wind farm in northeastern Iowa. The Weston Power Plant is coal-fired power plant rated at 981 megawatts and is located near Wausau, Wisconsin. The Weston 4 unit was built in 2008 and is considered to be one of the cleanest coal-fired power plants in the country. J. P. Pulliam Generating Station is also a coal-fired generating plant with a capacity of 375-megawatt and is located near downtown Green Bay at the mouth of the Fox River. The Fox Energy Center is the company's most recent acquisition (2012). It is a natural gas–fired power plant, has a capacity of nearly 500 megawatts and is located near Kaukauna, Wisconsin.

Technology

Technology ("science of craft", from Greek τέχνη, techne, "art, skill, cunning of hand"; and -λογία, -logia) is the collection of techniques, skills, methods and processes used in the production of goods or services or in the accomplishment of objectives, such as scientific investigation. Technology can be the knowledge of techniques, processes, etc. or it can be embedded in machines, computers, devices and factories, which can be operated by individuals without detailed knowledge of the workings of such things.

The human species' use of technology began with the conversion of natural resources into simple tools. The prehistoric discovery of how to control fire and the later Neolithic Revolution increased the available sources of food and the invention of the wheel helped humans to travel in and control their environment. Developments in historic times, including the printing press, the telephone, and the Internet, have lessened physical barriers to communication and allowed humans to interact freely on a global scale. The steady progress of military technology has brought weapons of ever-increasing destructive power, from clubs to nuclear weapons.

Farm

A farm is an area of land that is devoted primarily to agricultural processes with the primary objective of producing food and other crops; it is the basic facility in food production. The name is used for specialised units such as arable farms, vegetable farms, fruit farms, dairy, pig and poultry farms, and land used for the production of natural fibres, biofuel and other commodities. It includes ranches, feedlots, orchards, plantations and estates, smallholdings and hobby farms, and includes the farmhouse and agricultural buildings as well as the land. In modern times the term has been extended so as to include such industrial operations as wind farms and fish farms, both of which can operate on land or sea.

Farming originated independently in different parts of the world as hunter gatherer societies transitioned to food production rather than food capture. It may have started about 12,000 years ago with the domestication of livestock in the Fertile Crescent in western Asia, soon to be followed by the cultivation of crops. Modern units tend to specialise in the crops or livestock best suited to the region, with their finished products being sold for the retail market or for further processing, with farm products being traded around the world.