Ken Malloy
Founder & Community Organizer
Ken Malloy is the Founder and Executive Director of the Energy Exceptionalism Project, the Founder and Executive Director of CRISIS & Energy Markets, a think tank (CAEM), the President of the Virginia Ecovierg Policy Institute (VEPI), and a Senior Fellow with the Ocean State Policy Research Institute. To ensure its independence and credibility, CAEM does not accept contributions from government, energy or environmental corporations, trade associations, law or consulting firms.
In contrast to Energy Independence, Envirocentrism, Finitism, Inclusivism, and LaissezFairism critiques, CAEM pioneers Energy Exceptionalism, a framework founded on principles that will solve the Nation’s energy problems, achieve global sustainability, and restore American global leadership in the energy sphere. Energy Exceptionalism relies heavily on economic principles that recognize:
• the benefits of robust, level playing field competition in energy markets;
• the critical role of innovation, technology, and adaptivity in meeting energy challenges;
• the dysfunction of energy markets caused by market failures (especially monopoly and environmental externalities), and misguided government interventions (especially unnecessary subsidies and mandates and heavy-handed regulation); and
• the wisdom of cautionary government intervention disciplined by the lessons of energy policy history.
Using the principles of Energy Exceptionalism, CAEM will soon release the Nation’s Energy Report Card (NERC) and the Responsible Ecoviergy Policy Index (REP Index at www.caem.org/repindex). The NERC is an annual analysis of the state of energy markets in the United States, based on a survey of 25 nationally recognized energy experts, resulting in a grade on the academic scale for each of 20+ energy resource categories and an aggregate score. The REP Index is an evaluation of specific policy proposals (e.g., the Pickens Plan or the Waxman/Markey bill) using 10 microeconomic attributes, allowing readers to make a variety of different comparisons of different plans against each other. CAEM recently completed an economic analysis of the
Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), the first carbon cap and trade in the US, evaluating its first year of operation.CAEM conducts research and analysis into the impact on energy markets of proposals to deal with climate change, imports of oil,volatile prices/supply, and other crises that are used opportunistically to further distort energy markets. CAEM does not advocate aposition on climate change science per se or whether climate change is anthropogenic. It does however adopt a rigorously market oriented view of energy markets and the tools used to affect climate change policy. CAEM largely adopts the position of Bjorn
Lomborg in his book Cool It, that costs for climate change policies should be measured against other positive things for which that money could be used. When such a rigorous calculation is made, radical carbon mitigation is a very poor investment.
Ken was formerly the CEO of the Center for the Advancement of Energy Markets, which he founded in 1999, which promoted competition in electricity markets. Ken was named by Public Utilities Fortnightly as one of five “Energy Innovators: Ringing
in an Age of Enlightenment.” The Center produced the Retail Energy Deregulation Index (RED Index), a report card on 6 international jurisdictions’ electric competition policies.
He is internationally recognized as a bold visionary on energy policy and competitive markets, having been featured on CNN,PBS’s Nightly Business Report, Time Magazine, MSNBC, Business Week, US News and World Report, National Public
Radio, National Review, the Washington Post, NY Times, Chicago Tribune, Christian Science Monitor, and USA Today.
He has given 1000+ energetic, provocative, and entertaining presentations over the last three decades to every sector of the energy industry, including the US Senate and House and numerous state commissions.
He was the U.S. Department of Energy’s lead career official on policies relating to competition, regulatory reform, and industry restructuring over three Administrations (1987 to 1996). A lawyer by training, he has held positions in the areas of natural gas,
electricity, and oil policy. He was Deputy Executive Director and General Counsel of the Illinois Commerce Commission,Director of FERC’s Office of Economic Policy, and staff attorney in FERC’s Office of General Counsel. During his FERC andDOE tenure, he advocated Reagan Administration reforms that resulted in a revolution in natural gas markets. One high point was
his advocacy of a controversial interpretation of the Natural Gas Policy Act, which was reversed by the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals, but upheld by a unanimous US Supreme Court, resulting in more robust competition in natural gas markets and billions of dollars in benefits to consumers (FERC vs Martin Exploration, 486 US 204 (1988)). Prior to FERC, Ken was a law professor
at Western New England College School of Law, teaching in the area of federal economic regulation of industry. Ken graduated with honors from Boston College Law School in 1978, where he was an author and editor of the Boston College Law Review.
He has taken graduate economics courses at George Mason University.