Creating Environmental Impact at the State Level

Rebekah Daniel (MSES '23) shares how MSES prepared her to thrive as a regulatory analyst for the California Public Utilities Commission.

California Senate Bill 100 was a groundbreaking piece of legislation enacted in 2018 that required 100 percent of retail electricity sold in the state be powered by renewable energy and zero-carbon resources by 2045. In doing so, California became the second state to set such aggressive targets, joining only Hawaii, which passed a similar mandate in 2015.

The bill, titled "The 100 Percent Clean Energy Act of 2018," also set a goal for 60 percent of the state's electricity to be renewable by 2020. It is an example of the power state-level political decisions can have, said Rebekah Daniel (MSES '23), regulatory analyst for the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC).

"State policies are more nimble than federal ones in a lot of ways," Daniel said. "Depending on the political climate, a lot of things are subject to change federally. It’s important for states to be able to create environmental policies to protect their needs when the federal government isn’t able. And I think it’s good to have a precedent to show the federal government that environmental policies can be achievable to be able to spread across the country."

Daniel joined the CPUC soon after graduating from Northwestern's Master of Science in Energy and Sustainability (MSES) program, a joint offering by Northwestern Engineering and the Paula M. Trienens Institute for Sustainability and Energy. She works on the demand response team that manages programs across the state used to shift or shed loads of electricity. The role requires her to work on customer data privacy and third-party market integrations.

Daniel also works on load impact protocols that determine how much capacity parties are allowed to bid into the electricity market. Load serving entities are allowed to bid into the market based on past performance and future projects. Each year, those entities file a report that is approved by three teams at the CPUC, as well as a team at the California Energy Commission. Her job is to manage the process, making sure information is moving between teams and that filing procedures are being followed.

Daniel said she would not have this job without her experience in MSES.

Prior to enrolling in the MSES program, Daniel thought she wanted a degree focused on environmental policy. MSES ultimately appealed to her because of its broad approach to teaching about energy.

"I was a biology major, and I wanted to make sure I wasn't just learning legislature, but how these energy processes worked and how that drives decision making," she said. "The program did a good job at giving a holistic approach to energy, not just the tech and policy but also business and finance, and how it's actually implemented today."

Daniel got a firm understanding of those processes in Resource Markets Design, Regulation, and Reform. The core class taught her about electric utility regulators, ultimately preparing her for her current role. She applied to the CPUC because of the class, she said.

"(The class) gave me a full primer for my current position, and when I got the job it was really easy to integrate into," she said. "I already knew how the markets worked. I just had to transfer my knowledge from the Illinois market to the California market."

Beyond preparing Daniel for her current job, MSES taught her the importance of challenging herself. As a student, it's easy to pick one thing to focus on and learn exclusively about that, she said. MSES showed her the value of broadening her knowledge base. It's a lesson she continues to apply to her work today.

"I try to challenge myself by always accepting when someone asks if I want to learn about a new topic related to an upcoming project or sit in on discussions about things that I'm not currently working on," she said. "It's given me a better view of demand response as a whole and how all the different programs work together to help keep our lights on."