Charles Hua unveils PowerLines, a new coalition with a mission to accelerate access to affordable, reliable, and clean energy by modernizing the utility regulatory system, with particular attention to public utility commissions (PUCs).
Retired bank regulator here. PUCs sound exactly like bank regulators--except that banks have a habit of blowing up every 10-15 years or so, and thus occasionally get public attention.
I'm a resident of California. Our PUC (the CPUC) has good visibility with both the public and the legislature, and yet, many residents are not happy with their performance..
I believe we need commissioners in the CPUC that bring varied skills and perspectives to the table. Perhaps the current composition worked well in the past but I believe we need a different set of commissioners to deal with the very fast changes in the energy space.
Currently the Governor can choose anybody for the CPUC commission. Changing this will be politically complicated but there is a precedent I like. I like the way the California Energy Commission works and I think their composition helps. The selection process is:
"The Governor appoints, with Senate confirmation, five commissioners to staggered five-year terms. The commissioners must come from and represent specific areas of expertise: law, environment, economics, science/engineering, and the public at large."
PUC staffer here, have been for either about two years or about one week depending on how you count. Not going to address everything in this pod, but just to talk about the talent pipeline: first, a lot of the smartest people i've ever met have been commissioners and staffers, and second I got into this by accepting a DOE-sponsored fellowship out of grad school. It's a pretty small program but has been growing, and largely on the recognition that it's basically impossible to get a degree in being a PUC staffer and the initial learning curve is like el capitan. So yes there is a real push to build the state capacity mentioned, it's just been flying relatively under the radar.
Yep. The work I did to transform DER compensation for Texas ERCOT residents relied on the direct support of a PUC staffer who was a DOE fellow. Her name is Tiffany Wu, she is a mentee and a rock star, now at TEPRI
I have been an Intervenor at Idaho PUC proceedings and completely agree that this effort is needed. Light should be shown on how Governors appoint PUC commissioners. Idaho Power should not be allowed to send campaign donations to legislators nor should PUC members be former legislators who have received IPC campaign contributions.
Also, legislators legislate 100 + issues. No legislator is an expert in economic cost of service regulation let alone anything else. It's not their job to be. Putting lawmakers in charge of natural monopoly regulation is insane.
How appropriate to listen to this podcast just as North Carolina's appeals court ruled on an important case involving our PUC. The following are direct quotes from NC WARN's email newsletter:
"The court said that the clean energy groups challenging the regulators’ decision were correct in insisting that the North Carolina Utilities Commission, or NCUC, was required to conduct a cost-benefit analysis of solar net metering. The ruling said the NCUC’s claim that it didn’t have to do so was “plainly absurd and in direct conflict” (p. 20) with state law.
But the court said that by simply opening a docket on Duke’s proposed rule change and receiving formal comments from other parties, while denying multiple requests for an evidentiary hearing, the NCUC had in fact conducted a sufficient cost analysis.
'The appeals court seemed to go out of its way to give Duke the win,' said Jim Warren, executive director of NC WARN. 'Even the rubber stamp regulators admitted they didn’t do a cost-benefit analysis, but that Duke’s internal numbers were OK. Bizarrely, the court ruled that the regulators’ limited proceeding did count as the analysis.'"
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It is hard to unravel the causal forces here. Is the NCUC really just 'in Duke Energy's pockets', or do they feel they don't have the necessary governmental support or regulatory authority? Is it lack of staffing to conduct such a study? Difficult to untangle, but frustrating that our state's PUC does not seem to be acting in the public's interest in this and many other instances.
Community Voices in Energy is aimed at creating a more just and inclusive energy future, by bringing lived experience onto the legal record at PUCs. Our work has already changed minds at state PUCs like IL and MA. https://communityvoicesinenergy.org/resource-library/
Fire damage program is called PSPS in Cali. Thankfully there are some programs like ELRP that compensate ppl with self gen capabilities or load reduction too, which motivates reliance on price signal programs instead of emergency surprise shutoffs.
David -- I enjoyed following this interview with Charles Hua on the importance of Public Utility Commissions in determining our energy future. I was surprised that neither he nor you mentioned Third Act, founded by Bill McKibben with chapters in early every state. They have three priority areas of focus, one of which is PUC's. They have been mobilizing people to pay attention to their PUCs for all reasons that Charles and you discuss. Here is a link to their "Power Up Communities" web page. A leader on this work is Nancy LaPlaca -- she'd be great for you to interview. https://thirdact.org/our-work/power-up-communities/. Apprerciate your good work. Fran Korten, Bainbridge Island, WA
Retired bank regulator here. PUCs sound exactly like bank regulators--except that banks have a habit of blowing up every 10-15 years or so, and thus occasionally get public attention.
Well, it seems power outages are becoming more and more common, so there's the public attention
I'm a resident of California. Our PUC (the CPUC) has good visibility with both the public and the legislature, and yet, many residents are not happy with their performance..
I believe we need commissioners in the CPUC that bring varied skills and perspectives to the table. Perhaps the current composition worked well in the past but I believe we need a different set of commissioners to deal with the very fast changes in the energy space.
Currently the Governor can choose anybody for the CPUC commission. Changing this will be politically complicated but there is a precedent I like. I like the way the California Energy Commission works and I think their composition helps. The selection process is:
"The Governor appoints, with Senate confirmation, five commissioners to staggered five-year terms. The commissioners must come from and represent specific areas of expertise: law, environment, economics, science/engineering, and the public at large."
PUC staffer here, have been for either about two years or about one week depending on how you count. Not going to address everything in this pod, but just to talk about the talent pipeline: first, a lot of the smartest people i've ever met have been commissioners and staffers, and second I got into this by accepting a DOE-sponsored fellowship out of grad school. It's a pretty small program but has been growing, and largely on the recognition that it's basically impossible to get a degree in being a PUC staffer and the initial learning curve is like el capitan. So yes there is a real push to build the state capacity mentioned, it's just been flying relatively under the radar.
Yep. The work I did to transform DER compensation for Texas ERCOT residents relied on the direct support of a PUC staffer who was a DOE fellow. Her name is Tiffany Wu, she is a mentee and a rock star, now at TEPRI
GreR to hear. Tiffany was in the same cohort as me and she's awesome.
I have been an Intervenor at Idaho PUC proceedings and completely agree that this effort is needed. Light should be shown on how Governors appoint PUC commissioners. Idaho Power should not be allowed to send campaign donations to legislators nor should PUC members be former legislators who have received IPC campaign contributions.
Also, legislators legislate 100 + issues. No legislator is an expert in economic cost of service regulation let alone anything else. It's not their job to be. Putting lawmakers in charge of natural monopoly regulation is insane.
How appropriate to listen to this podcast just as North Carolina's appeals court ruled on an important case involving our PUC. The following are direct quotes from NC WARN's email newsletter:
"The court said that the clean energy groups challenging the regulators’ decision were correct in insisting that the North Carolina Utilities Commission, or NCUC, was required to conduct a cost-benefit analysis of solar net metering. The ruling said the NCUC’s claim that it didn’t have to do so was “plainly absurd and in direct conflict” (p. 20) with state law.
But the court said that by simply opening a docket on Duke’s proposed rule change and receiving formal comments from other parties, while denying multiple requests for an evidentiary hearing, the NCUC had in fact conducted a sufficient cost analysis.
'The appeals court seemed to go out of its way to give Duke the win,' said Jim Warren, executive director of NC WARN. 'Even the rubber stamp regulators admitted they didn’t do a cost-benefit analysis, but that Duke’s internal numbers were OK. Bizarrely, the court ruled that the regulators’ limited proceeding did count as the analysis.'"
----------------------------
It is hard to unravel the causal forces here. Is the NCUC really just 'in Duke Energy's pockets', or do they feel they don't have the necessary governmental support or regulatory authority? Is it lack of staffing to conduct such a study? Difficult to untangle, but frustrating that our state's PUC does not seem to be acting in the public's interest in this and many other instances.
Community Voices in Energy is aimed at creating a more just and inclusive energy future, by bringing lived experience onto the legal record at PUCs. Our work has already changed minds at state PUCs like IL and MA. https://communityvoicesinenergy.org/resource-library/
Fire damage program is called PSPS in Cali. Thankfully there are some programs like ELRP that compensate ppl with self gen capabilities or load reduction too, which motivates reliance on price signal programs instead of emergency surprise shutoffs.
David -- I enjoyed following this interview with Charles Hua on the importance of Public Utility Commissions in determining our energy future. I was surprised that neither he nor you mentioned Third Act, founded by Bill McKibben with chapters in early every state. They have three priority areas of focus, one of which is PUC's. They have been mobilizing people to pay attention to their PUCs for all reasons that Charles and you discuss. Here is a link to their "Power Up Communities" web page. A leader on this work is Nancy LaPlaca -- she'd be great for you to interview. https://thirdact.org/our-work/power-up-communities/. Apprerciate your good work. Fran Korten, Bainbridge Island, WA
Fran you will enjoy mine with Doug Lewin too. https://www.douglewin.com/p/integrating-distributed-energy-resilience
Thanks.