Travis Kavulla joins NRG

This week, NRG welcomes a new vice president for Regulatory Affairs. Travis Kavulla joins NRG after a decade of work as a policy wonk and government regulator. Previously, Travis headed up energy and environmental policy for the R Street Institute, a think tank, and before that was twice elected to public office as a utility commissioner in Montana. Travis has also held leadership roles in national policy circles, including as president of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners. During his work in public life, Travis has written dozens of articles and speeches on electricity policy and regulation.

Working at NRG offers an opportunity to “practice what you preach.” I’ve been an advocate for competition in the power sector throughout my time in the industry. NRG has been a leader in that movement, and I’m coming on-board to build upon the good work the firm has done. 

Electricity is one of the last businesses in America that continues to be dominated by monopolies in many states. That’s changing. States like Texas offer a shining example of a competitive marketplace that has served customers well. As a result, the arguments against empowering customers have never been weaker. And the reasons to give customers a choice in their energy provider—both cost savings and environmental benefits—have only grown stronger over the years. 

Why am I passionate about competition? Simply put, because I was a government regulator who learned the disadvantages of doing it the other way first-hand. I was frequently asked to bless the big decisions proposed by a monopoly utility, and as a regulator I tried to scrutinize every aspect of the filings that were submitted to me. But that kind of oversight is not a substitute for making companies compete against one another for the business of customers. Put another way, when companies are  bargaining for favorable treatment by politicians and regulators, they aren’t necessarily sharpening their pencils on behalf of customers. In fact, they are often doing the opposite. 

A robustly competitive market brings its own set of challenges—and I’m looking forward to help solve them. Competitive power markets are good at delivering on cost—but they usually have not been set up to perform on environmental goals. Because of that, we risk in many states going back to the Bad Old Days where regulators handpick the power plants that they think will achieve their desired outcome. At NRG, we will continue to promote innovative policy solutions that allow states to achieve progress on environmental goals, without sacrificing the customer benefits derived from a competitive marketplace. 

One way or another, we are entering a time when the generation of electricity that depends on weather is growing and is replacing electricity derived from physical supplies of fuel like coal, natural gas, and uranium. This more renewable portfolio is driving a conversation about what other attributes of power supply are necessary to assure system reliability. We must ensure that those reliability attributes are defined by engineering, not political calculations. We will also do right by customers if we ensure those reliability attributes, once defined, are “productized” and subject to the same type of robust trade that has allowed customers the benefit of lower-cost energy supplies in this era of abundance and innovation. Policymakers have little toleration for the risk of blackouts. The right way to solve for that risk is to face suppliers like NRG with incentives not to come up short.

Finally, competition policy in the electric sector will only continue to succeed if we have a customer-service mindset. Nothing will destroy the competitive market more quickly than unscrupulous players taking advantage of customers for short-term gain. NRG has a leadership role to ensure the industry has standards for customer protection, while at the same time making it easier for customers to shop around. 

That’s my mission, and I look forward to taking the advice of others as I chart this course. Have questions or comments? E-mail me at travis.kavulla@nrg.com, and follow me on Twitter @tkavulla