Credit: Tom Knox
COLUMBUS — “Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, R, on Monday, named energy attorney and lobbyist Samuel Randazzo as the new chairman of the Public Utility Commission of Ohio (PUCO), sparking criticism from renewable energy advocates and environmentalists.
Randazzo, a former lobbyist for industrial energy consumers, has worked against wind development in Ohio for years and helped craft a 2014 state law that froze renewable energy and efficiency standards. In a 2018 report, he wrote renewable resources “don’t show up to work” and criticized the “excess investment” of utility grid modernization initiatives and the cost-of-service regulatory model.
Current Chairman Asim Haque will step down in March to join grid operator PJM as its executive director of strategic policy and external affairs. One vacancy remains on the commission.”
— Gavin Bade, Utility Dive
