With budgets and goals for energy efficiency rising dramatically and the scrutiny of rate and demand-side management (DSM) filings becoming increasingly intense, building and maintaining positive, constructive relationships with regulatory groups is more critical than ever.

Do you often finding yourself in conflict with your regulators or city council? What strategies for working with regulators have proven to be the most productive?

Don’t miss this closed-door web conference exclusively for members of the E Source Efficiency & Demand-Response Programs Service. In this “offline” conversation, we’ll openly discuss the most effective ways to engage with regulators, councils, and other groups that govern utilities. This web conference will be held in a roundtable fashion with no set speakers, allowing utility representatives from across the country share their experiences with what’s worked and what hasn’t. The intent of this discussion is to identify key strategies that will enable effective relationships that optimize the time spent with your regulators, permitting you to spend the vast majority of your time on program implementation and customer relationships.

Come prepared to voice your opinions and experiences, and bring specific questions you want to ask the group. The success of this web conference depends solely on audience participation.

You will learn:

• How relationships with regulatory groups are characterized
• How constructive regulatory relationships have been cultivated
• Whether regulatory relationships are generally proactive or reactive
• Whether appointed or elected regulators are easier to work with
• Whether city councils are easier to work with than public utilities commissions
• Who offers DSM training sessions to regulators and their staff and whether they’ve been successful in getting regulators and utilities on the same page
• Whether DSM departments typically work directly with regulators or whether all communications flow through regulatory or legal departments
• How often program plans are approved and at what level of depth are they approved (for example, are only megawatt savings are approved or are detailed program approvals required?)
• Whether working closely with regulators that require deeper program approval facilitates a better relationship
• What obstacles have prevented regulators from approving filings (for example, rate increases) and how to address those obstacles

Who should attend: Members of the E Source Efficiency & Demand-Response Programs Service.