Former DOE Adviser Launches PowerLines Nonprofit to Modernize Utility Regulations and Reduce Energy Costs for Consumers.

Charles Hua, a former Department of Energy policy adviser, has launched a nonprofit, PowerLines, aiming to modernize utility regulations and lower energy bills. The group will focus on the regulation of electricity and gas by public utility commissions, which regulate how much people pay for electricity and how much utilities invest in different forms of energy. About 200 PUC commissioners nationally oversee more than $200 billion of annual utility spending. Hua, who now works as a researcher at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, believes that PUCs are the most important body for energy consumers that nobody is aware of.