The Consumer Advocates of the PJM States (CAPS) has named longtime Pennsylvania government official Dan Griffiths as its first director.

Griffiths, who was chosen from among 20 candidates, will represent CAPS in PJM stakeholder meetings and coordinate communications and strategy. Incorporated last year, CAPS includes consumer advocates for the District of Columbia and 13 states served by PJM.

“I think Dan’s going to be just the right guy,” said Stefanie Brand, president of CAPS and director of the New Jersey Division of Rate Counsel. “He has extensive experience at PJM and a good background on the issues facing the consumer advocate offices. We really want to increase our participation in the stakeholder process and I know Dan will hit the ground running.”

Pennsylvania Experience

Griffiths worked for 18 years at the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, serving as manager of planning and research in the Bureau of Consumer Services and as energy assistant to then-Commissioner David W. Rolka.

From 1997 to 2000, he worked as vice president for corporate development at New Energy Ventures (now Constellation New Energy), the director of operations at the Energy Cooperative Association of Pennsylvania, and as a consultant for Customized Energy Solutions.

He moved in 2000 to the Pennsylvania Office of Consumer Advocate as a senior analyst, where he represented consumers before PJM and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

In 2007, he left the consumer advocate’s office to become deputy secretary in the Office of Energy and Technology Deployment at the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.

After retiring from his state post in 2010, he worked as a consultant for Sustainable Futures Communications, LLC and represented demand response provider Comverge at PJM.

CAPS’ Priorities

Griffiths and Brand said CAPS’ priorities include the PJM capacity market and transmission planning.

“There are tens of millions of people whose electricity costs are largely determined in [PJM], so it’s very important for them to have someone representing them,” Griffiths said in an interview.

CAPS’ bylaws requires that any position taken by the organization be based on a unanimous vote of the board of directors. Because some member states have competitive retail markets while others remain cost-of-service regimes Griffiths said it may be rare for the group to achieve the unanimity required to make filings at FERC.

At PJM meetings, Griffiths will cast proxy votes for individual states if requested.