Recent Projects

As distributed energy resources (“DER”) are becoming increasingly common, the debate on how customers with such systems should be compensated is intensifying in many states. The National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) is creating a Distributed Energy Resources Compensation Manual to assist states with these policy decisions. We recently submitted comments to NARUC’s Staff Subcommittee on Rate Design regarding the most economically desirable approach to use for DER compensation.

The 2015 New York State Energy Plan set one of the most ambitious clean energy targets in the nation: 50 percent of all electricity used in the state should be generated by renewable energy sources. The Department of Public Service Staff recently released a White Paper on the Clean Energy Standard, with recommendations on how to achieve this ambitious goal. We submitted comments to the New York State Public Service Commission, outlining some additional steps that can help ensure that the Clean Energy Standard is not excessively costly, and is effective in achieving all of its policy goals.

We recently submitted comments to the New York Public Service Commission on how the Commission should develop an interim successor to its net metering policy, and how distributed energy resources should be valued in the future. We filed the comments jointly with the Environmental Defense Fund. To begin to move the retail electricity markets toward efficient and accurate recognition of the value of distributed energy resources, we suggest that the Commission should enhance its existing net energy metering policy to align compensation with the system benefits provided by distributed energy resources; establish a fully unbundled retail price structure; and specifically account for the environmental benefits of distributed energy resources in future pricing structures.

We recently submitted an amicus brief in the litigation over the EPA’s Clean Power Plan, which regulates carbon dioxide emissions from the power sector. A group of coal companies and states is asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to strike down the rule, arguing that it represents an unprecedented expansion of the EPA’s regulatory authority. Our brief shows that, in fact, there are regulatory precedents for every aspect of the rule that petitioners claim is unprecedented. Our analysis of past EPA regulations and court rulings reveals that the Clean Power Plan is consistent with decades of Clean Air Act practice under administrations of both parties.

Concurrently with issuing its final Clean Power Plan to limit greenhouse gas emissions from existing power plants, the EPA issued a set of proposed federal plan requirements and model trading rules to provide states guidance as they determine their strategies to comply with the Clean Power Plan. We recently submitted comments to the agency on how these guidelines can be improved to best reduce compliance costs and promote effectiveness of the plan.

We recently submitted comments on New York State’s Reforming the Energy Vision (REV) initiative

Richard Revesz testified at today’s House Energy & Commerce Committee hearing, “EPA’s CO2 Regulations for New and Existing Power Plants: Legal Perspectives.”