Frontlines

That’s the Median for Commissioners and Chairs.

How much is enough? That’s so often the central question for those considering investments in our national defense. Along with secondary questions of nearly equal importance, such as, should we invest in this particular defense program? Or that one instead?

What do we mean when we say that something is unaffordable? I ask for a very good reason.

What do you want to write about, to impact the sustainable resilient affordable debate?

I have been thinking about persistent myths of affordability. Such as that electric bills in isolation can be unaffordable. Another myth is that low-income households have high electric bills. Many households are unquestionably under great and growing stress. If we aspire to make a difference for them, we ought to better target who they are and reach for the tools in our collective toolboxes at utilities and in utility regulation that can really help.

As we contemplate how we, in the fashion of Odysseus, shall confront the various Scylla and Charybdis of the new year, it is good to remember the strengths of our ship at sea.

General Electric began selling pre-assembled Christmas light kits in 1903. Until then, lighting your tree electrically was expensive and the installation, complicated. Toy electric trains started out as a store window display that would draw the attention of shoppers to the store.

Tom Kuhn has taken a distinctive approach to leading the Edison Electric Institute. He tirelessly sought to drive his diverse membership of investor-owned electric utilities to an agreement to act that was significantly tougher to come to, but significantly more impactful for the utilities industry, for the customers the industry serves, and for our nation.

The density of utility regulatory and policy folks in the more than adequately air-conditioned JW Marriott Austin, gathered there for NARUC’s Summer Summit, even after adjusting for the three-digit temperatures outside the conference’s hotel, hit record highs.

I smiled when I realized NARUC was holding its 2023 Summer Policy Summit in Austin, Texas.