IWG Partners with NARUC on Federal-State Collaboration for Energy Community Revitalization Webinar

Earlier this week, leaders from several federal agencies under the Interagency Working Group (IWG) on Coal and Power Plant Communities and Economic Revitalization presented at the “Federal-State Collaboration for Energy Community Revitalization” webinar hosted by the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC).

The webinar highlighted opportunities for collaboration with state public utility commissions, as well as available federal funding to support energy workers across the nation.

IWG Executive Director Brian Anderson, Ph.D.; IWG Deputy Executive Director Briggs White, Ph.D.; and U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) Deputy Assistant Secretary for Regional Affairs Craig Buerstatte presented a comprehensive overview and lessons learned from the IWG’s initial report to President Biden and the working group’s energy community economic revitalization efforts thus far. 

“This webinar is what IWG is all about – working to continuously identify resources and strategies to support energy workers and communities as the country goes through the largest energy transition in a century. We want to work more closely with public state utility commissions to reduce the barriers our coal, power plant, and oil and gas communities currently face to access these resources with the goal of increasing innovation and economic growth in those regions,” said Anderson.

“NARUC’s mission to ensure everyone in the country has access to essential utilities, like energy, power, and water, directly relates to IWG’s mission to revitalize and rebuild the energy communities who fueled our country’s prosperity,” said White. “It is a privilege to continue these conversations with state public utility commissioners as we know they are directly interfacing with the utilities that are developing plans that impact energy communities.”

The National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners is a non-profit organization founded in 1889 whose members include the governmental agencies that are engaged in the regulation of utilities and carriers in the fifty states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. NARUC’s member agencies regulate telecommunications, energy, and water utilities. NARUC represents the interests of state public utility commissions before the three branches of the Federal government.

Established by an Executive Order in President Biden’s first week in office, the IWG is pursuing a whole-of-government approach to create good-paying union jobs, spur economic revitalization, remediate environmental degradation and support energy workers in coal, oil and gas, and power plant communities across the country as the U.S. prepares to undergo a historic energy evolution to a carbon emission-free electricity sector by 2035 and economy-wide net-zero emissions by 2050.