I met some fans of my column today. I didn’t have the heart to tell them that InDepthNH.org has decided to cancel the column, effective immediately. Should I try to marshal support for reversing this decision? Or just move on? I can, after all, run my musings on the office we site (OCA.nh.gov).

How have I managed to avoid writing about nuclear power for this long? The wait is over; here's my latest column. www.oca.nh.gov/news-and-med...

This is an important week in the history of the NH Office of the Consumer Advocate as a bill to "clip the wings" of me and my office is likely to get a favorable committee vote on Wednesday. indepthnh.org/2025/10/30/e...

Great video, @hankgreen.bsky.social, but you're dreaming if you really think regulators typically give utilities a return on equity of "around 8 percent." I and my expert witnesses asked for a number that low recently and got ignored by my state's PUC.

I did not realize until today what a cesspool THIS platform had become until I had the nerve to push back gently against the posts I was reading here that argued Janet Mills should not be allowed to run for Senate because she is too old. 1/3

Today on Volts: hey listen up! The most important election of the year is happening in Georgia next month. Two seats on the (currently all-GOP) Public Service Commission are up & rising electricity prices are on everyone's mind. This is a bellwether for next year's governor & midterm elections!

Today the House Committee on Executive Departments and Administration takes up a new version of HB610, originally introduced to abolish my office — the Office of the Consumer Advocate (OCA), which fights for NH’s residential utility customers. Now the bill no longer abolishes the OCA. Instead . . .

Yay! Applegreen is the worst -- see any of their rest areas in NY or Maine -- and Global Partners is an excellent company. I hope the MassDOT pivots to the other bidder without delay. www.bostonglobe.com/2025/09/23/b...

Where lies the final harbor, whence we unmoor no more?

It's been a quiet week in Lake Wobegone: Two of New England's top utility regulators go down in the same week -- NH on Monday; CT on Friday. I'm dizzy.

Dr. Susan Monarez: “I could have stayed silent, agreed to the demands, and no one would have known. What the public would have seen were scientists dismissed without cause and vaccine protections quietly eroded…I would have lost the one thing that cannot be replaced: My integrity.”

Someone must have reminded the Governor of how it went down the last time a PUC chair left office. Well into the evening, she signed an order to phase out ratepayer-funded energy efficiency programs. This time was different.

NH PUC Chairman Goldner out of a job as if 5pm per the governor’s office.

Governors who care about bloated rates for electric utilities should take a hard look at the lavish returns being granted to utility shareholders. www.linkedin.com/posts/donald...

The Epilepsy Foundation of New England should be ashamed of itself! open.substack.com/pub/n1303k/p...

Clear-eyed @ezraklein.bsky.social on the stakes: "We are in the authoritarian consolidation stage of this presidency... This is not just how authoritarianism happens. This is authoritarianism happening." www.nytimes.com/2025/09/07/o...

Eversource System Operators Picket for a 1st Union Contract indepthnh.org/2025/09/03/e...

Fellow Granite Staters: Here's a proverbial special invitation and yes there is a free lunch involved. If you care about the future of our electricity grid, attend the 9/11 meeting of the ISO New England Consumer Liaison Group, at noon, at SNHU. Register here: web.cvent.com/event/7e9e5dcf 1/x

Power to the People: Don’t Believe the Eversource Blarney indepthnh.org/2025/08/29/p...

NEW QUINNIPIAC POLL: Trump approval rating: 37% Trump's handling of: Crime: - 12 Russia/Ukraine: -12 Foreign Policy: -16 Economy: -18 Trade: -18 Israel/Hamas/Gaza: -19 Sending weapons to Israel: -28 National Guard to DC: -15 Epstein files: -48 Smithsonian: -27 poll.qu.edu/poll-release...

in this world, head winds are far more prevalent than winds from astern

Today we are taking the first step toward an appeal of the New Hampshire PUC's order in the Eversource rate case. www.oca.nh.gov/news-and-media/oca-challenges-unjust-and-unreasonable-eversource-rate-case-decision

Are you an attorney with an interest in energy law who yearns for the ultimate white-hat job? If so, let’s talk. Im hiring a staff attorney to litigate alongside me at the NHPUC and elsewhere on behalf of the state’s residential utility customers.

Interview: Donald Kries (@dmokreis.bsky.social) NH Consumer Advocate on Electric Rate Increases, Energy Co-Ops & Public Utilities Commission #NHPolitics youtu.be/tr9zkA9zexw

This was a great discussion with my new friend Carter Hammond from Peterborough. Here's hoping that his newly revived "Locally Sourced" interview series really catches on! youtu.be/tr9zkA9zexw

Very pleased to see this article about unaffordable and inaccessible cystic fibrosis medications in the prestigious British medical journal The Lancet today. Too many people around the world are dying of CF unnecessarily. It's a moral outrage. www.thelancet.com/journals/lan...

Come join us for a free lunch and discussion of how to improve ISO New England, noon to 3:30 p.m. at SNHU in Manchester. www.oca.nh.gov/news-and-media/join-us-manchester-thursday-september-11

And who would pass up such a convenient opportunity to study practical cetology? Not me!

Eversource won big at the PUC on July 25. The least the company could do would be to inform customers of their new and higher rates. Why do we at the Office of the Consumer Advocate have to do it for them? www.oca.nh.gov/news-and-media/fog-rate-case-war

Friday morning, Eversource CEO Joe Nolan bragged to investors about the "fantastic" rate case decision he got out of the NHPUC. Hours later, his company demanded that the PUC sweeten the deal even further. Good grief. www.oca.nh.gov/news-and-media/eversource-investors-fantastic-rate-case-order

How Is the Montana Shooting Suspect Still at Large? Check Out the Terrain. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/04/u...

As a cystic fibrosis dad, watching the price of the most important CF drugs soar to a list price of $370,000 a year, I have a hard time concluding that the problem is freeloading by other countries. EVERY CF PERSON on the planet deserves access to these life-saving medications.

Okay, my fellow pigeon poisoners. If Tom's death did not brighten up an otherwise dull afternoon, savor THIS! Part of the Lehrer oeuvre that I was today years old before discovering. It's tasteless! Culturally insensitive! Blazing Saddles meets Harvard Square! www.theautopian.com/rip-tom-lehr...

PUC to Eversource Customers: Drop Dead indepthnh.org/2025/07/29/p...

Story of my life in one sentence.

Tom Lehrer’s forward to Too Many Songs By Tom Lehrer.

This must-read thread may just be the best tribute to the great Tom Lehrer you will encounter here.

Learning Tom Lehrer and Stephen Sondheim knew each other from childhood summer camp forces me to imagine a conversation in which they both said, “I’m going to be the best there ever was at the kind of songs I will write,” and they were both correct.

A tribute to Tom Lehrer (RIP) from 2024, TftKC #671

Pour one out for Tom Lehrer for keeping it real

A member of my pantheon of heroes has died. n1303k.substack.com/p/heres-to-t...

Tom Lehrer had a good long slide down the razor blade of life. I grew up on his music and am deeply grateful for his contributions to American culture. www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TAs...

The New Hampshire PUC has issued its order in the Eversource distribution service rate case. Overall, it was Eversource 1, ratepayers 0. Check out our initial analysis. We are mulling over our options. oca.nh.gov/news-and-media/puc-hands-eversource-rate-case-win

The U.K. Plans to Lower the Voting Age to 16. Here’s What to Know. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/17/w... great but doesn’t go far enough. I support NO minimum voting age. If you can complete the registration form and ballot you should be allowed to vote, no matter how young.

A bad week for CF Nation! Vertex is again raising the already obscenely high price of its cystic fibrosis drugs. Co-incidentally, celebrity CF poster child Gunnar Esaison has been speaking out, apologizing as usual for Big Pharma. Read my open letter to him. n1303k.substack.com/p/an-open-le...

I don't know enough about school funding to have a take on yesterday's decision of the NH Supreme Court. But I'm disappointed to see our gov (a lawyer) condemn the decision as "wrong." The Court is the highest authority on matters arising under the NH Constitution. But the rule of law is fragile.

Squeeze! squeeze! squeeze! all the morning long; I squeezed that sperm till I myself almost melted into it

In case anyone cares what I make of today's announcement from ISO New England: www.linkedin.com/posts/donald...

A Former California Utility Exec Explains Why Your Electricity Bills Are So High insideclimatenews.org/news/1506202...