Jay Griffin

Jay Griffin was appointed to the Hawaii Public Utilities Commission (HPUC) in 2017 and served as Chair for over 3 years. During this time, the HPUC led an award-winning, stakeholder process to implement performance-based regulation for the state’s largest electric utility. In addition, the Commission oversaw the largest procurements of renewable energy in state history and transition plans to retire aging, fossil-fueled power plants, including Hawaii’s last coal plant. To support these plant retirements, the Commission also directed new and existing customer programs to help meet peak demand periods with distributed energy resources.

Prior to serving on the HPUC, Griffin was an Assistant Researcher at the Hawaii Natural Energy Institute at the University of Hawaii. His research focused on grid integration studies of renewable energy and demonstration projects to support the state’s clean energy goals. From 2012-2016, he served as the Chief of Policy and Research at the HPUC.

Jay has a Ph.D. in Policy Analysis from the Pardee Rand Graduate School where he also served as a policy researcher from 2004-2009. Griffin has a M.A. in Economics from the University of California at Santa Barbara and a joint master’s degree from Duke University in Public Policy and Environmental Management. Jay graduated from Williams College with a B.A. degree in Political Economy.