Edison Electric Institute: The Darth Vader of Electricity

In the second installment of our Sunlight is the Best Disinfectant series, Nancy LaPlaca discusses the Edison Electric Institute, a powerful, 90-year-old tax-exempt utility trade group that does the dirty work for electric utilities, using political and financial muscle to game the rules for dirty energy. EEI has been stopping progress on clean energy for well over a decade. The head of EEI is Donald Trump’s former Energy Secretary, Dan Brouillette.

I’ve been working in electric and gas utility issues for nearly 20 years, and been increasingly horrified by the biased, corrupt system that we call “utility regulation” but is really pay-to-play. I’ve had enough time to understand what’s going on, and it isn’t pretty. However, it’s important to remember that we can change the system, and we have lots of allies (like No Coal No Gas and Citizen) who want the same thing: a fair, unbiased and transparent regulatory system that counts all costs – not just the ones the utility wants us to see. The current system overpays utilities to give us what we don’t want, and utility profits explode as they gorge on fossil fuels and kill competition. 

Democratized energy and a healthy democracy go hand in hand. Unfortunately, both are at risk right now. Our voices and our bodies are sorely needed to help create change.

Overhauling our current system of regulating electric utilities is a good place to start. After food, water and shelter, we need electricity. And finally, after thousands of years of burning stuff to cook or stay warm or run our gadgets, we no longer have to do that. We have solar, wind, energy efficiency, geothermal and even humble window film. We just need to put these great solutions to work. As Bill McKibben says repeatedly, we just have to point a sheet of glass at the sun to generate electricity. 

So how does Edison Electric Institute (EEI) fit in here? As one of the most politically powerful trade groups in D.C., EEI influences national, state and even local electricity decisions. Why? Because nearly every investor owned electric utility in the U.S. is a member, and each member utility pays dues every year. EEI’s ~$100 million per year budget buys a lot of favors, ads, reports, expert witnesses, fancy dinners, boat rides, travel, and nice hotel rooms.

And who ultimately sends that $100 million per year to EEI? Why, it’s captive ratepayers like us, who else? 

However, we have solutions, so don’t despair! Four states – CO, CT, ME and MI – have outlawed utility political contributions, and eleven (AZ, CA, IL, MD, MN, NY, OH, PA, RI, UT, and VA) have introduced legislation. 

The Electric Utility Cabal: EEI, Utilities and Regulators

EEI often does the dirty work for utilities. Captive customers of Florida’s utilities were forced to pay for attacks on rooftop solar.  Utilities in sunny states have some of the most anti-solar policies in the U.S. An EEI gathering described the risks posed by net metering solar as well as climate activists. Why else would utilities in sunny states push fossil gas and kill solar electricity? Because utilities make more profit burning coal, they don’t pay the stunning damages from burning fossil fuels, and they are keen to kill competition from solar, wind and anything that reduces sales and profits. 

Utilities really only have one customer: the regulators.

All too often, the enablers of this bad behavior are the utility regulators. As one expert put it, utilities really only have one customer: the regulators. Utilities wine and dine the regulators and give them high-level jobs with fat paychecks after they’ve done their “public service.” The number of examples could fill a book. Perhaps that’s another reason utilities have been so under-the-radar.: utility regulation tends to be inherently boring.

The final irony is that we customers pay utility executives between $10 and $20 million per year to give us dirty energy we don’t want that is destroying our future. Utility PR departments tell us that coal is clean, coal ash is edible, climate change isn’t real, and that toxic pollution is not a problem. 

Too many regulators allow corporate cash to crush competition, shut out honest people who want to participate in decision-making or run for office, and buy politicians who then set utility-friendly policies.

It is often youth who feel thrown under the bus by these terrible decisions, and as they see it, the government is to blame. However, the real issue is our unfair rules and lack of oversight. Too many regulators allow corporate cash to crush competition, shut out honest people who want to participate in decision-making or run for office, and buy politicians who then set utility-friendly policies. And remember utilities have plenty of money, because it all comes from our electric bills. 

So what can we do?

• Get Trained! Listen in on recordings from the three-part PUC Leadership Training Series (LINK: Resources section of PUC landing page) in which we first walk you through the basics and then more advanced concepts and tools, so you can understand how this system works. Right now, Third Actors are affecting policies across the U.S., helping to bring about the transformation we need.
  • ABCs of PUCs
  • What’s Up, Docket?
  • Stand and Deliver: the Nuts and Bolts of PUC Intervention

• Sign up for your local Third Act Working Group. Across the country, local TA groups are organizing and taking action with support from allies, to engage with their state’s Public Utility Commission, to intervene and give comments in regulatory hearings, to hold utility companies accountable, and to take direct action to fight injustice in the system!

• Take Action Nationwide! We’re powerful when we work together. The Edison Electric Institute, the fossil fuel companies and for-profit utilities have a lot of money, but we have people power. As part of Power Up Communities!, we’ll ask you to help leverage key moments where we can harness political will to make change. Currently, that means write the Senate EPW Committee: Vet and Approve Board Members for the Tennessee Valley Authority Committed to Affordability and Climate Leadership!

Third Actors are speaking truth to (political) power – about (electrical) power! Considering only the last two months: volunteers in nearly a dozen states  gave testimony and submitted public comments inside these regulatory hearings, and when regulators don’t listen, you are engaging in nonviolent protest, taking action outside the halls of power too!

From Texas to Pennsylvania to North Carolina to New York to Vermont, Third Actors are making a difference. Let’s go!

Nancy LaPlaca

Nancy LaPlaca (she/her), J.D., is an Energy and Climate Policy Consultant for Third Act’s Power Up Communities Campaign. She has 40 years of public policy experience, including 19 years of professional experience in electric/gas utility issues. Nancy has served as Policy Advisor to an elected Public Utilities Commissioner (Arizona, 2009-13), and was a public interest intervener at state-level public utilities commissions in AZ, CO and NC.

Her areas of expertise include coal, natural gas, power plants, net metering, rate cases, renewable portfolio standards, and a wide range of electric, gas, and water utility dockets in a half dozen states.