Kevin McIntyre and Richard Glick have been confirmed by the Senate to join the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, giving FERC its full complement of five members for the first time in the past two years. McIntyre, a Republican and co-leader of the global Energy Practice at the law firm Jones Day, will take over as chairman. Glick has been serving as general counsel for Democrats on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
Paul Dabbar was confirmed as undersecretary of science at DOE and Mark Menezes as undersecretary of energy for management and performance. The Senate also approved Paul Winberg to lead the department’s fossil energy office. Dabbar is a former Navy nuclear submarine officer who worked on energy sector mergers and acquisitions for J. P. Morgan for more than 20 years. Menezes has been serving as vice president of federal relations for Berkshire Hathaway Energy, and Winberg led research and development for CONSOL Energy.
The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee scheduled a hearing for today to consider the nominations of Kathleen Hartnett-White to run the White House Council on Environmental Quality and Andrew Wheeler to be deputy administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Hartnett-White is a former chair of the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a conservative think tank. A climate change denier and an ethanol opponent, Wheeler was expected to run into opposition from Democrats and some farm-state Republicans. Wheeler is a principal with Faegre Baker Daniels Consulting and co-leader of the firm’s energy and natural resources practice.
President Trump has nominated Linda Capuano to run the Energy Information Administration. Capuano is a fellow at the Baker Institute for Public Policy’s Center for Energy Studies at Rice University. She is also a former vice president at both Marathon Oil Co. and Advanced Energy Industries.
J.P. Freire has moved back to Capitol Hill, this time as communications director and policy adviser for Rep. Dennis Ross, R-Fla. Ross previously served as the associate administrator at EPA. Before that, he was a communications director for Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah and earlier for then-Rep. Mike Pompeo of Kansas, who now heads up the CIA.
Associated Petroleum Industries of Pennsylvania (API-PA) named Jonathan Lutz as the new associate director for API’s division in Pennsylvania. Lutz previously served as executive director for the Environmental Resources and Energy Committee of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives.
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