Smart Grid Leadership Awards Presented in Washington at National Town Meeting on Demand Response and Smart Grid

WASHINGTON, June 22 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Demand Response Coordinating Committee (DRCC) announced today the latest recipients of its Demand Response and Smart Grid Leadership Awards. The recipients are Dr. George Arnold, the National Coordinator for Smart Grid Interoperability at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and Commissioner Paul Centolella of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio.

The awards will be presented at the DRCC's 2010 National Town Meeting on Demand Response and Smart Grid, to be held in Washington, DC, on June 23rd and 24th at the Mayflower Hotel.

Dan Delurey, Executive Director of the DRCC, applauded the award recipients for their efforts to move states and the nation as a whole towards development of a smart grid and the deployment of smart grid activities like demand response. "The past year will be marked as a watershed year in the history of demand response and smart grid," said Delurey.  "At the federal, state, and local levels, policymakers have been working to make the grid more reliable, efficient, and secure, and to enable customers to become smart electricity consumers. Dr. Arnold and Commissioner Centolella are two who stand out. Their work is a driving force, and the Demand Response Coordinating Committee is pleased to be honoring their accomplishments and their leadership."

The National Town Meeting on Demand Response and Smart Grid is the annual gathering in Washington of the policymakers and business leaders whose actions are realizing the vision of the modern grid. "As the seventh National Town Meeting, this year's event looks to be the most consequential one yet," Delurey said. "With all that has happened in the smart grid and demand response arena in the last year---the DOE smart grid grants, the growing consumer interest, the increased national media coverage---the Town Meeting's speakers and participants have a lot to talk about, and a lot to cover. On top of that, FERC delivered its National Action Plan to Congress last week, and the effort to implement the Plan will actually begin at the conference, and participants will get a chance to vote on implementation priorities. At the Town Meeting, the demand response community will be looking back but also ahead as we prepare for the challenges and opportunities ahead of us"

The list of speakers at the National Town Meeting, and its agenda, can be found at www.smartgridtownmeeting.com.  

Dr. George Arnold is the National Coordinator for Smart Grid Interoperability at NIST, a division of the US Department of Commerce. He joined NIST in September 2006 and served as the Deputy Director of Technology Services prior to his current role. In addition to his NIST responsibilities, Dr. Arnold continues to be active in external standards organizations. He currently serves as Vice-President-Policy for the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and President of the IEEE Standards Association. He also has been the Chairman of the Board of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), a private, non-profit organization that coordinates the US voluntary standardization and conformity assessment system. Earlier in his career, Dr. Arnold was a Vice-President at Bell Laboratories and worked at Lucent Technologies and AT&T in research and development, product management, quality management and process re-engineering. Dr. Arnold received a Doctor of Engineering Science degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Columbia University in 1978. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE.

Commissioner Paul Centolella, who has served Ohio since his appointment to the PUCO by Governor Strickland in 2007, is also active in regional and national efforts in smart grid, demand response, and climate change. He is the Secretary of the Organization of PJM States as well as a member of the Smart Grid Collaborative and the Demand Response Collaborative run by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and the National Association of State Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC). Additionally, he serves on NARUC's Climate Change Task Force and NARUC's Energy Resources and Environment Committee. He also has published numerous books and articles about public utilities regulation, electricity markets, and environmental policy. From 1992 to 2007, Commissioner Centolella was a Senior Economist in the Energy Solutions Group of Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) where he managed projects involving energy and environmental market design, electric power system operations, and economic policy analysis. From 1982 to 1992 he was the Senior Energy Policy Advisor and a Senior Utility Attorney for the Office of the Ohio Consumers' Counsel (OCC). In that role, he helped develop market-based approaches to environmental regulation, which accelerated emission reductions and reduced the costs of the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments. Commissioner Centolella earned a bachelor's degree with honors in economics from Oberlin College and his J.D. from the University of Michigan Law School.

About the DRCC

The Demand Response Coordinating Committee (DRCC) is a non-profit organization formed in 2004 to develop information and content on demand response and smart grid and to facilitate the exchange of information and expertise between different regions of the country as well as among demand response practitioners and policy makers. Among the DRCC's many activities is its National Town Meeting on Demand Response and Smart Grid, the country's premier event devoted to this policy and business issue area.  

Members of the DRCC are Ameren, American Electric Power, Arizona Public Service, CPower, ISO New England, Itron, Landis+Gyr, Midwest ISO, National Grid, NYSERDA, Pacific Gas & Electric, PJM Interconnection, Progress Energy, Salt River Project, San Diego Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison, Southern Company, Tennessee Valley Authority, Viridity Energy, Wal-Mart

More information on the DRCC can be found at www.demandresponsecommittee.org.

SOURCE Demand Response Coordinating Committee (DRCC)