Energy and Utilities Law Commons^™

Fracking: The Unconventional Energy Response To Climate Change: Implications For The Real Estate Industry, 49 J. Marshall L. Rev. 449 (2015), Celeste Hammond

Celeste M. Hammond

No abstract provided.

The Road Less Travelled: The Maine Energy Cost Reduction Act, Economic Federalism, And A Modern Approach To Preemption Analysis Under The Natural Gas Act Of 1938, Benjamin T. Mccall

Maine Law Review

The saying “you can’t get there from here” is as authentically Maine as blueberries or lobster. Made famous in the mid-20th century by the storytelling troupe Bert and I, the colloquial phrase typifies the quirkiness and with that one often encounters north and east of the New Hampshire border. Despite the attempt at humor, the saying is apropos when one considers Maine’s position in both New England and the country. Being at the end of the line certainly has its advantages, among them being hundreds of square miles of untamed forest, and a bevy of natural resources that provide both …

A Us Clean Energy Transition And The Trump Administration, Joseph P. Tomain

Faculty Articles and Other Publications

The Obama administration undertook several steps giving the US federal government a leadership role in a clean energy transition. Among other actions, the administration develop a Climate Action Plan, successfully negotiated higher fuel vehicle standards with car manufacturers, passed the Clean Power Plan, and signed the Paris Climate Agreement. Although the United States had been party to other international climate agreements and was a signatory to the Rio Declaration, other federal efforts were lax at best.

During his election campaign, Donald Trump promised his supporters to eliminate the Clean Power Plan, withdraw from the Paris Agreement, curtail the Environmental Protection …

Contractors’ State License Board, Mayra Castro, J. D. Fellmeth

California Regulatory Law Reporter

No abstract provided.

Naïve Energy Markets, David B. Spence

Notre Dame Law Review

Two interrelated trends—the growing popularity within the GOP of the conservative intellectual challenge to the New Deal consensus, and the rise to dominance of economic theory within regulatory and energy policy debates—have obscured the importance of regulation to well-functioning energy markets. This Article uses contemporary energy policy disputes to illustrate how and why energy markets can never resemble the idealized markets of economic theory that have become so popular in conservative policy discourse.

Paradoxes Of “Decarbonization”, David B. Spence

Brooklyn Law Review

Scholars and policymakers continue to debate the shape of a post-carbon world, and how fast the United States can “decarbonize” its energy sector. Recent trends—including the reduced costs of renewables, regulatory and market pressure on coal-fired power, and successful integration of large amounts of wind power into the grid—have fed optimism about the possibility of rapid and “deep” decarbonization. Unfortunately, however, encouraging ever-more substitution of renewables for fossil fuels creates unintended consequences—paradoxes—that stem in part from two sometimes unavoidable and under-appreciated truths. First, the three attributes we value in the electricity system—cost, reliability and environmental performance—are in tension with one …

Breaking Energy Path Dependencies, Amy L. Stein

Brooklyn Law Review

Of the many barriers to clean energy development discussed in the literature, the power of the status quo is not normally one of them. Yet beyond the need for more transmission lines, the need to decouple electricity sales from revenue, or the need to amend our environmental laws to more fully capture the externalities of energy, efforts to develop clean energy are faced with over a century of institutional “stickiness” associated with the legal and regulatory framework governing energy. This article explores how path dependency theories can inform the practical legal efforts to overcome such stickiness, identifying the troublesome approaches …

The Political Economy Of Decarbonization: A Research Agenda, Eric Biber, Nina Kelsey, Jonas Meckling

Brooklyn Law Review

Addressing climate change entails daunting policy challenges for nations seeking to decarbonize their energy systems. Current policies are inadequate to achieve the necessary reductions in greenhouse gas emissions in major part because of political resistance to more aggressive policies. Academic policy research to date has primarily focused on what policies are economically optimal, or on what is politically feasible in the short-term. But given the long-term nature of the problem and the scale of the policy challenges, an essential question is how to improve the political landscape for aggressive climate policies over time. In this paper we outline a research …

Field Of Visions: Interorganizational Challenges To The Smart Energy Transition In Washington State, Scott Frickel, Daniela Wühr, Christine Horne, Meghan Elizabeth Kallman

Brooklyn Law Review

The smart grid promises an efficient, reliable, and sustainable energy system. Smart meters provide machine-to-machine communication capacity and are key elements of the smart grid. Smart meters allow utilities to improve system efficiency and reliability and allow electricity users to closely monitor, fine-tune, and reduce energy consumption and costs. For these and other reasons, positive expectations for the smart grid and smart meters run high among policymakers, regulators, engineering and computer science professionals, industrialists, environmentalists, and others. Even so, different organizations and stakeholders define and understand the technology in different ways. For some actors smart meters are a tool for …

Grassroots Innovation Systems For The Post-Carbon World: Promoting Economic Democracy, Environmental Sustainability, And The Public Interest, Shobita Parthasarathy

Brooklyn Law Review

This article uses a sociotechnical systems approach to advocate for an alternative way of thinking about the role of innovation in international development efforts, specifically those focused on environmental sustainability and a post-carbon world. This approach views technology and society as inextricably linked, highlighting how particular values, norms, individual rights and responsibilities, social practices and relationships, and aspects of political culture are embedded in the design, development, implementation, and use of technology. Using the example of clean cookstoves, this article argues that technologies customarily deployed to achieve international development goals are embedded in particular values, assumptions, and social structures that …

Fairness In The Low-Carbon Shift: Learning From Environmental Justice, Uma Outka

Brooklyn Law Review

This article looks to the environmental justice movement for how it can inform the current transitional moment in the energy sector. As policy and market forces solidify a low-carbon trajectory, this article argues there is a unique and time-sensitive context for justice concerns in the energy transition. The decades-long failure to substantiate legal protections for environmental justice underscores the importance of building into legal structures as they emerge in the evolving energy regulatory landscape. Change is happening quickly and discordant notions of fairness are competing for validation in the energy policy space. This article highlights examples of competing fairness claims …

Improving Green Building: Comparing Leed Certification To The Fda And Its Private, Third Party Rating Approach, Patrick Kain

American University Business Law Review

No abstract provided.

Measuring The Effect Of Electric Utility Deregulation On Residential Retail Prices In A Midwestern State, Sam Owens

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

The deregulation of the electric utility industry is one of the largest deregulation efforts in U.S. history. Proponents argue that getting rid of the outdated utility model of regulated monopolies and introducing competitive markets will lower prices, increase efficiency, and result in a net benefit for the nation. Opponents, on the other hand, believe that both the tumultuous history of the electric utility industry and experiments with deregulation have shown that competitive markets for electricity are too open to manipulation and will result in increased prices for consumers and dangerous volatility in the provision of electricity. This paper will attempt …

Shooting Stars And Dancing Fish: A Walk To The World We Want, Tony Oposa

Environmental Law Program Publications @ Haub Law

From the foreword by Durwood Zaelke, President, Institute for Governance & Sustainable Development, Washington, DC.

“Since the beginning of time, human knowledge and culture have been passed down through stories. Short stories, songs, prayers, poems, even paintings can stick in your mind forever. These have always been the most powerful ways we learn and remember.

Tony is not only one of the world’s greatest lawyers, he is also one of the world’s greatest storytellers.

This book, in which he generously shares his experiences, his scars, and most importantly his humanity, is Tony’s gift to generations to come.

But he does …

Keeping The Fox From Managing The Henhouse: Why Incumbent Utilities Should Not Be Allowed To Operate The Distribution System Platform, James M. Van Nostrand

Law Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Nuclear Energy: Kentucky's New Coal?, Katie Haagen

Kentucky Journal of Equine, Agriculture, & Natural Resources Law

No abstract provided.

States Will Be Big Fans: A State Driven Regulatory Process For Offshore Wind Development Off U.S. Coastlines, Erin K. Benson

University of Baltimore Law Review

No abstract provided.

Book Review, The Electric Battery: Charging Forward To A Low-Carbon Future, Joel Eisen

Law Faculty Publications

The Electric Battery is the product of a Vermont Law School team led by Kevin Jones, the school’s Director of the Institute for Energy and the Environment. It is an essential resource for scholars, policymakers and others interested in the future for storage technologies in transportation and electricity, the sectors of the economy that produce the most greenhouse gases. Professor Jones brings considerable expertise to the project, having produced well-regarded reports on smart grid issues, and some projects mentioned in the book – such as the partnership between Tesla and Green Mountain Power – are located in the authors’ home …

Ferc's Small Hydropower Exemption: A Missed Opportunity, Alex B. Clay

Kentucky Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Clean Electrification, Shelley Welton

Faculty Publications

To combat climate change, many leading states have adopted the aim of creating a “participatory” grid. In this new model, electricity is priced based on time of consumption and carbon content, and consumers are encouraged to adjust their behavior and adopt new technologies to maintain affordable electricity. Although a more participatory grid is an important component of lowering greenhouse gas emissions, it also raises a new problem of clean energy justice: utilities and consumer advocates claim that such policies unjustly benefit the rich at the expense of the poor, given the type of consumer best able to participate in the …