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Full-Text Articles in Energy and Utilities Law

Reclaiming Regulatory Intermediation For The Public, Daniel E. Walters Nov 2023

Reclaiming Regulatory Intermediation For The Public, Daniel E. Walters

Faculty Scholarship

Managerial governance is often operationalized through outsourcing the regulatory function from public institutions—for example, administrative agencies—to private organizations. In virtually any sector, it is possible to identify private “regulatory intermediaries” that step between public agencies and regulated parties to perform tasks traditionally played by government actors—for example, the development of regulatory standards, auditing, compliance assurance, enforcement, and more. Although this reliance on private regulatory intermediaries may in some cases be highly advantageous to government institutions since it may sometimes allow government agencies to do more regulatory work than their own resources and capacity might allow—it comes at significant costs of …


Grid Governance In The Energy-Trilemma Era: Remedying The Democracy Deficit, Daniel E. Walters, Andrew N. Kleit May 2023

Grid Governance In The Energy-Trilemma Era: Remedying The Democracy Deficit, Daniel E. Walters, Andrew N. Kleit

Faculty Scholarship

Transforming the electric power grid is central to any viable scenario for addressing global climate change, but the process and politics of this transformation are complex. The desire to transform the grid creates an “energy trilemma” involving often conflicting desires for reliability, cost, and decarbonization; and, at least in the short run, it is difficult to avoid making tradeoffs between these different goals. It is somewhat shocking, then, that many crucial decisions about electric power service in the United States are made not by consumers or their utilities, nor by state public utilities commissions or federal regulators. Instead, for much …


Climate Choice Architecture, Felix Mormann Jan 2023

Climate Choice Architecture, Felix Mormann

Faculty Scholarship

Personal choices drive global warming nearly as much as institutional decisions. Yet, policymakers overwhelmingly target large-scale industrial facilities for reductions in carbon emissions, with individual and household emissions a mere afterthought. Recent advances in behavioral economics, cognitive psychology, and related fields have produced a veritable behavior change revolution. Subtle changes to the choice environment, or nudges, have improved stake-holder decision-making in a wide range of contexts, from healthier food choices to better retirement planning. But the vast potential of choice architecture remains largely untapped for purposes of climate policy and action. This Article explores that untapped potential and makes the …


Presidential Progress On Climate Change: Will The Courts Interfere With What Needs To Be Done To Save Our Planet?, Michael B. Gerrard Jan 2021

Presidential Progress On Climate Change: Will The Courts Interfere With What Needs To Be Done To Save Our Planet?, Michael B. Gerrard

Faculty Scholarship

The Biden Administration is undertaking numerous actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and transition away from fossil fuels as part of the fight against climate change. Many of these actions are likely to be challenged in court. This paper describes the various legal theories that are likely to be used in these challenges, assesses their prospects of success given the current composition of the Supreme Court, and suggests ways to minimize the risks.


Whither The Regulatory "War On Coal"? Scapegoats, Saviors, And Stock Market Reactions, Cary Coglianese, Daniel E. Walters Oct 2020

Whither The Regulatory "War On Coal"? Scapegoats, Saviors, And Stock Market Reactions, Cary Coglianese, Daniel E. Walters

Faculty Scholarship

Complaints about excessive economic burdens associated with regulation abound in contemporary political and legal rhetoric. In recent years, perhaps nowhere have these complaints been heard as loudly as in the context of U.S. regulations targeting the use of coal to supply power to the nation’s electricity system, as production levels in the coal industry dropped by nearly half between 2008 and 2016. The coal industry and its political supporters, including the president of the United States, have argued that a suite of air pollution regulations imposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency during the Obama administration seriously undermined coal companies’ …


Litigating Epa Rules: A Fifty-Year Retrospective Of Environmental Rulemaking In The Courts, Cary Coglianese, Daniel E. Walters Jun 2020

Litigating Epa Rules: A Fifty-Year Retrospective Of Environmental Rulemaking In The Courts, Cary Coglianese, Daniel E. Walters

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


Greening The Old New Deal: Strengthening Rural Electric Cooperative Supports And Oversight To Combat Climate Change, Gabriel Pacyniak Jan 2020

Greening The Old New Deal: Strengthening Rural Electric Cooperative Supports And Oversight To Combat Climate Change, Gabriel Pacyniak

Faculty Scholarship

New Deal cooperatives succeeded in electrifying rural America when for-profit utilities would not. Today, however, rural electric cooperatives are lagging behind when it comes to meeting the challenge of climate change. Cooperatives have collectively been slower to embrace the shift to low-carbon electricity than for-profit and municipal utilities and have served as a drag on state and federal clean energy and climate policies. This is partially because of the structural differences between cooperatives and other utilities, but also because of a weak and under-determined federal and state regulatory structure. A few cooperatives in Colorado and New Mexico are seeking to …


Regulatory Cooperation In International Trade And Its Transformative Effects On Executive Power, Elizabeth Trujillo Jan 2018

Regulatory Cooperation In International Trade And Its Transformative Effects On Executive Power, Elizabeth Trujillo

Faculty Scholarship

As international trade receives the brunt of local discontent with globalization trends and recent changes by the Trump administration have put into question the viability of such trade arrangements moving forward, there has been a clear trend in using international trade fora for managing regulatory barriers on economic development. This paper will discuss this recent trend in international trade toward increased regulatory cooperation through the creation of formalized transnational regulatory bodies, such as the U.S.-EU Regulatory Cooperation Body that was being discussed in the TTIP negotiations and comparable ones in the Canadian-EU Trade Agreement as well as U.S.-Mexico and U.S.- …


Blood Biofuels, Nadia B. Ahmad Jan 2017

Blood Biofuels, Nadia B. Ahmad

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


A Primer: Air And Water Environmental Quality Standards In The United State, Jason J. Czarnezki, Siu Tip Lam, Nadia B. Ahmad Jan 2015

A Primer: Air And Water Environmental Quality Standards In The United State, Jason J. Czarnezki, Siu Tip Lam, Nadia B. Ahmad

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


Billionaires, Birds, And Environmental Brawls: Reconceptualizing Energy Easements, Nadia B. Ahmad Oct 2014

Billionaires, Birds, And Environmental Brawls: Reconceptualizing Energy Easements, Nadia B. Ahmad

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


Completing The Energy Innovation Cycle: The View From The Public Utility Commission, Jonas J. Monast, Sarah K. Adair Jan 2014

Completing The Energy Innovation Cycle: The View From The Public Utility Commission, Jonas J. Monast, Sarah K. Adair

Faculty Scholarship

Achieving widespread adoption of innovative electricity generation technologies involves a complex system of research, development, demonstration, and deployment, with each phase then informing future developments. Despite a number of non-regulatory programs at the federal level to support this process, the innovation premium—the increased cost and technology risk often associated with innovative generation technologies—creates hurdles in the state public utility commission (“PUC”) process. These state level regulatory hurdles have the potential to frustrate federal energy goals and prevent the learning process that is a critical component to technology innovation. This Article explores how and why innovative energy technologies face challenges in …


A Step By Step Look At Uarg V. Epa: A New Layer Of Greenhouse Gas Regulation, Kevin O. Leske Jan 2014

A Step By Step Look At Uarg V. Epa: A New Layer Of Greenhouse Gas Regulation, Kevin O. Leske

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


Missouri Oil And Gas Update, Nadia B. Ahmad Jan 2014

Missouri Oil And Gas Update, Nadia B. Ahmad

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.


Designing Co2 Performance Standards For A Transitioning Electricity Sector: A Multi-Benefits Framework, Jonas J. Monast, David Hoppock Jan 2014

Designing Co2 Performance Standards For A Transitioning Electricity Sector: A Multi-Benefits Framework, Jonas J. Monast, David Hoppock

Faculty Scholarship

A significant transition is underway within the electricity sector due to several market forces, retirement of certain plants, and regulatory pressures. There is notable overlap between available strategies for mitigating electricity sector risks and potential compliance strategies for states under the Clean Power Plan. This overlap presents regulators with an opportunity to pursue strategies that help manage the transition occurring in the electricity sector and achieve greenhouse gas reductions required under the Clean Power Plan, particularly in the areas of end-use energy efficiency and additional renewable power generation.


Energy Policy: Past Or Prologue?, Michael J. Graetz Jan 2012

Energy Policy: Past Or Prologue?, Michael J. Graetz

Faculty Scholarship

The United States was remarkably complacent about energy policy until the Arab oil embargo of 1973. Since then, we have relied on unnecessarily costly regulations and poorly designed subsidies to mandate or encourage particular forms of energy production and use. Our presidents have quested after an elusive technological “silver bullet.” Congress has elevated parochial interests and short-term political advantages over national needs. Despite the thousands of pages of energy legislation enacted over the past four decades, Congress has never demanded that Americans pay a price that reflects the full costs of the energy they consume. Given our nation’s economic fragility, …


Mission Possible: Reciprocal Deference Between Domestic Regulatory Structures And The Wto, Elizabeth Trujillo Jan 2007

Mission Possible: Reciprocal Deference Between Domestic Regulatory Structures And The Wto, Elizabeth Trujillo

Faculty Scholarship

One of the goals of Article III of GATT is to invalidate domestic regulatory measures, including taxes and non-fiscal policies that amount to non-tariff barriers to trade (NTB) and therefore violate the principles of national treatment. While internal policies that directly discriminate between products based on nationality or origin are clearly in violation of national treatment principles, it is the facially neutral regulatory measures with protectionist and discriminatory effects that are more difficult to assess, even within transparent regulatory processes. However, with their emphasis on the likeness of the products in question, WTO panels run the risk of alienating member …