Energy is an essential service, and utility regulation exists, first and foremost, to protect customers. But utility regulators across the U.S. are experiencing a period of immense change. Energy systems are shifting rapidly, and the regulatory processes and broader frameworks guiding that evolution have not kept pace. Common-sense reforms have become polarized, evaluated through ideological lenses rather than by principles of good governance and demonstrable public benefit. This dynamic has made it harder for utility commissions to have neutral, evidence-based discussions about fundamental assumptions around cost, risk, and long-term system impacts.

RAP convened the Council of Commissioners to bridge these gaps. As a nonpartisan group of former commissioners from diverse regions who have served under different political leadership, market structures, and through multiple phases of industry transformation, the Council will use its collective experience to support sitting commissioners and strategically weigh in on issues of national importance. The Council understands the gravity of the detailed, formal work undertaken every day by regulatory agencies and the broader conversation among policymakers, stakeholders, and the public that shapes the evolution of energy policy and regulatory frameworks across the country.

The Council will engage these questions without the constraints of partisanship, institutional inertia, or advocacy agendas. The Council’s role is not to promote predetermined solutions, but to clarify tradeoffs and elevate the choices that will most benefit the public interest.

In its first year, the Council will focus on two interlinked challenges that nearly all commissions face: rising energy prices compounding affordability pressures on American households and businesses and managing the complex impacts of unprecedented load growth on our energy systems. The Council understands the difficult environment that commissioners currently face. Inflation, changing fuel costs, aging infrastructure, and the data center surge collectively pressure commissions to review rate increases and massive capital investments, quickly. Approaching this moment through the lens of risk and opportunity can help avoid locking in unnecessary costs and risks while investing in infrastructure that supports American productivity.

The Council’s Charge and Ongoing Engagement

The Council of Commissioners was formed not only to support sitting commissioners, but to help shape the conversation about energy regulation. Drawing on decades of experience, the Council intends to serve as both a trusted peer resource and as an independent source of thought leadership. In addition to providing ongoing guidance to RAP as research, analysis, and tools are developed, the Council will engage directly with sitting commissioners to strengthen regulatory practices. The Council is committed to speaking candidly about the structural challenges embedded in today’s regulatory frameworks that are holding the U.S. back from delivering an affordable, future-ready energy system.

Planned activities include:

• Supporting current regulators as trusted peers, advising on challenges, providing mentorship, and supporting bold decision making;
• peer-learning sessions centered on real cases and decisions, with structured dialogue focused on practical application of regulatory tools. We want to create space for commissioners to test assumptions, examine consequences, and learn from one another’s experiences across jurisdictions;
• convenings between regulators, consumer representatives, and policy leaders, recognizing the shared responsibility for ensuring that regulatory authority and statutory frameworks are aligned; and
• dissemination of public-facing materials that highlight key learnings, insights, and recommendations.

The Council’s approach reflects a commitment to independence and pragmatism. It will engage constructively with utilities, policymakers, and other stakeholders while remaining grounded in the obligation for public utility commissioners to serve the public. By combining peer support with thought leadership, the Council seeks to strengthen the capacity of commissions to govern effectively in an era of accelerated change.

How commissions respond to these connected challenges will shape not only system costs and performance, but the future of energy regulation itself. The Council is committed to constructively contributing to this work. By advancing evidence-based recommendations, candid discussions, and practical tools for decision-making, the Council aims to support commissioners as they confront the choices that will define the energy system for decades to come. Our goal is to ensure that energy regulators remain focused on their core purpose: delivering affordable and reliable service to the public.

Energy Affordability

Affordability concerns about energy costs have taken center stage, but there are approaches beyond cutting costs at every opportunity.  Today’s commissioners must consider customer impacts across multiple time horizons as they assess requests on rates, investments, and resource planning. The Council will support RAP in identifying best practices to improve U.S. commissions’ evaluation and decision-making, with an emphasis on holistic, practical comparisons of regulatory choices and their tradeoffs for energy affordability, reliability, and growth. While there is not a one-size-fits-all solution, the questions facing commissions and other policymakers have commonalities.

In the near term, rate cases require review of necessary investments and expenses, cost of capital to make necessary investments, the allocation of costs across customer classes, and the final prices for customers. At each step, commissions can improve rate case final outcomes by evaluating decisions through an energy affordability lens without undermining reliability or ignoring the financial health of utilities. In some cases, utility commissions have authority to speed up the procurement of new resources while driving down costs by streamlining generator siting and permitting. Many commissions will have authority to change relevant programs, procurement practices, and rate adjustment mechanisms. Policy makers can also update statutory frameworks to give commissions new tools to improve affordability with near- and medium-term reforms.  As examples, policymakers can explore reducing costs of necessary investments with securitization and public financing, and they can reconsider the balance between ratepayers and taxpayers funding new programs and investments.

While commissions have many tools to address customer impacts in upcoming decisions, short-term fixes will not solve today’s challenges alone. Structural reforms require thoughtful construction, collaboration across policymakers, experts and levels of government, and in many cases, changes to statutory frameworks.  Long-term reforms are already underway across the U.S.  For example, some states have initiated rate case reforms, such as multi-year rate plans with balanced performance metrics. Building on this momentum, additional longer-term reforms worth pursuing include:

• Scrutinizing capital investments in delivery, distribution, and infrastructure;
• ramping up demand-side flexibility to better utilize existing assets;
• reforming utility business models to achieve public interest outcomes more efficiently;
• integrating markets and opening energy systems to drive down costs;
• supporting innovation through scalable testing of new ideas;
• streamlining commission processes to operate more efficiently and focus on what matters; and
• re-establishing marginal cost analyses as a key tool to support improvements to planning, programs, cost allocation, and rate design.

These reforms can start to address today’s affordability challenges while building towards a 21st Century regulatory system. These efforts also align with needed reforms to address large load growth.  

Large Load Growth

Unprecedented load growth, driven in large part by data centers, is testing regulatory frameworks in many states and regions. Commissions are being asked to evaluate requests on compressed timelines, often with limited information and data, and significant uncertainty about the level of growth that will actually materialize. Decisions made about capital expenditures to meet the growing energy demand of large load customers will have long-term impacts on the grid and other customers. Without clear frameworks for cost responsibility, commissions risk shifting costs to existing customers or committing to infrastructure that won’t be needed to serve other customers over the long term. 

The Council will support RAP in assessing how commissions are managing large load growth today, where gaps exist, and what tools best support commission decision-making. In the near term, there are important regulatory issues that warrant focused examination:

• Best procedural approaches to evaluate large load requests while meeting expectations for transparency and timely decision-making;
• best practices in cost allocation and rate design to ensure fair costs for all customers;
• planning and procurement improvements that can account for uncertainty and optionality most effectively, and
• near-term interconnection reforms for large loads and generation.

In the longer term, many of the key solutions for large load growth echo the long-term solutions for affordability. However, large load growth more directly implicates the highest-level structural issues, such as the dividing lines between state and federal jurisdiction for data centers connecting directly to the transmission grid.