Marisa Gillett, chair of Connecticut’s Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA), talks about her aim to reform the cozy regulatory environment enjoyed by the state’s big utilities, PURA’s new Equitable Modern Grid Initiative, and how ratepayers benefit from a shakeup of the status quo.
This excellent podcast reminded me a lot of Xcel here - though Xcel may not be at the bottom of the barrel of those on the public dole as a utility monopoly, the rest of it applies.
DR, any updates on moving off Substack? Ed Zitron is switching to Ghost to enable his writing + podcast. I'm willing to give you time to figure it out, but this is no longer a place I can justify providing financial support.
How I wish she were on our PUC, and every PUC in the country! We pay a very high price for PUCs that are meek and beholden and influenced - some would say captured - by private utilities exerting their political influence.
I just had lunch with a friend of mine who works for our utilities commission, and while commiserating about the terrible state of renewable energy riders, consumer rate structures, and overall utility regulation here in NC there was a lot of "we can only regulate what we know about, we need more public comments" from my friend- I know it's not him, that's the party line from the NCUC. I've already sent him this episode to listen to, along with everybody I know working on the other side in policy advocacy. Unfortunately I doubt we'll see anybody like Chairwoman Gillett here in North Carolina any time soon, but it's nice to dream about.
Interesting to hear that the CT utilities have "the media" amplifying their message, despite the very high rates, and regular service interruptions.
In CO, Xcel gets endless grief from the media, activists, and consumer advocates despite lower-than-US average prices, almost flawless reliability and a decent and increasing renewables fraction. Xcel pushed a bit more renewables, mostly self-owned, in its last plan, and the PUC shot it down, claiming fears of "increased costs," and an excess of self-owned vs. IPP renewables. But the biggest inflationary risk is the cost of gas, given known shut-downs of coal plants. Xcel is pretty bad on the DER side, but we need the renewables in any case.
Some municipals and REA co-ops have better customer service and DER focus and rate flexibility, but their overall rates are no lower, and real renewable fractions not higher. (Except soon, Holy Cross Electric.) The PUC has slowed Xcel on TOU rates, etc.
I would sure say so and not all in all of the right ways. So far, we have no continuing investments, and a hostile environment. It seems like Gillett is more worried about how people are being mean to her than she cares about making sure she has a successful working relationship with the utilities she is hired to regulate.
A "successful working relation" in her role is making sure they serve the public good at reasonable cost, not being their friends. She didn't complain about people being "mean" and that's a comment I doubt you'd see here if she were male. We need people like her in every state now.
Very timely topic as our 17% rate increase (after last year's 7% increase) with Portland General Electric just went into effect on Jan. 1. I look forward to digging in!
This excellent podcast reminded me a lot of Xcel here - though Xcel may not be at the bottom of the barrel of those on the public dole as a utility monopoly, the rest of it applies.
Matt Stoller links to this interesting write up
https://ctmirror.org/2024/01/02/new-year-new-chapter-in-long-fight-over-cts-utility-regulator/
DR, any updates on moving off Substack? Ed Zitron is switching to Ghost to enable his writing + podcast. I'm willing to give you time to figure it out, but this is no longer a place I can justify providing financial support.
How I wish she were on our PUC, and every PUC in the country! We pay a very high price for PUCs that are meek and beholden and influenced - some would say captured - by private utilities exerting their political influence.
I just had lunch with a friend of mine who works for our utilities commission, and while commiserating about the terrible state of renewable energy riders, consumer rate structures, and overall utility regulation here in NC there was a lot of "we can only regulate what we know about, we need more public comments" from my friend- I know it's not him, that's the party line from the NCUC. I've already sent him this episode to listen to, along with everybody I know working on the other side in policy advocacy. Unfortunately I doubt we'll see anybody like Chairwoman Gillett here in North Carolina any time soon, but it's nice to dream about.
Interesting to hear that the CT utilities have "the media" amplifying their message, despite the very high rates, and regular service interruptions.
In CO, Xcel gets endless grief from the media, activists, and consumer advocates despite lower-than-US average prices, almost flawless reliability and a decent and increasing renewables fraction. Xcel pushed a bit more renewables, mostly self-owned, in its last plan, and the PUC shot it down, claiming fears of "increased costs," and an excess of self-owned vs. IPP renewables. But the biggest inflationary risk is the cost of gas, given known shut-downs of coal plants. Xcel is pretty bad on the DER side, but we need the renewables in any case.
Some municipals and REA co-ops have better customer service and DER focus and rate flexibility, but their overall rates are no lower, and real renewable fractions not higher. (Except soon, Holy Cross Electric.) The PUC has slowed Xcel on TOU rates, etc.
I would sure say so and not all in all of the right ways. So far, we have no continuing investments, and a hostile environment. It seems like Gillett is more worried about how people are being mean to her than she cares about making sure she has a successful working relationship with the utilities she is hired to regulate.
A "successful working relation" in her role is making sure they serve the public good at reasonable cost, not being their friends. She didn't complain about people being "mean" and that's a comment I doubt you'd see here if she were male. We need people like her in every state now.
Very timely topic as our 17% rate increase (after last year's 7% increase) with Portland General Electric just went into effect on Jan. 1. I look forward to digging in!