William (Bill) Steele
Mr. Steele has over 40 years of experience in public utility regulation in which he has acquired an extensive knowledge of the electric, natural gas and water industries. His expertise in revenue requirements, class cost-of-service studies, cost allocations, and rate design allowed him to serve his clients in utility accounting and financial matters.
Prior to forming Bill Steele and Associates LLC in May of 2012, he spent 34 years with the Colorado Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) as an advisor to the Commissioners, as well as, over 50 expert witness appearances as the supervisor of the financial analysts for trial staff in public utility policy and ratemaking proceedings.
Since forming Bill Steele and Associates LLC, Mr. Steele had provided expert witness and advisory services to some of the following clients: The Colorado Office of Consumer Counsel, The Alliance for Solar Choice (TSAC), Western Resource Advocates of Nevada, the Wire Group, Southwest Power Pool, the Alliance of Small Business Advocates for Oregon and California, the Attorney General of the state of Vermont, Gegax consulting and Tahoe Economics. In addition, Mr. Steele had provided in-house training services for some of the following organizations: the Colorado Public Utilities Commission, the Colorado Office of Consumer Counsel, the Montana Public Service Commission, Otter Tail Power, Cobb MEC, and a consortium of Nigerian Electric Distribution Utilities.
Mr. Steele is an adjunct professor of economics at New Mexico State University teaching courses in public utility regulation in the University’s Master of Economics program. In addition, Mr. Steele has also been an instructor at the “Basics of Regulation” training course offered by the Center for Public Utilities (CPU) at New Mexico State University for over 25 years. The main topics which Mr. Steele teaches included revenue requirements, a hands-on revenue requirement problem, class cost-of-service studies, and other regulatory topics as required. Mr. Steele in his role as an instructor at the CPU has trained numerous state commissioners, members of state commissions staff, as well as, members of industry and consumer advocate organizations. In addition, to being an instructor at the CPU, he also serves on the CPU’s Advisory Council. Besides teaching at the CPU, Mr. Steele also teaches a FERC 101 USofA accounting course and a course on Alternative Ratemaking Mchansims for the training firm EUCI. Starting in 2021, Mr. Steele teaches a course on Accounting for Ratemaking for Regulators for the National Regulatory Research Institute’s “Regulatory Training Initiative” program.
On January 5, 2018, Colorado Governor Hickenlooper by Executive Order (A 2008 002) appointed Mr. Steele to serve as a representative of small businesses on the Utility Consumers Board (UCB). Mr. Steele as a board member of UCB, provides to the Office of Consumer Counsel general policy guidance on matters that involve utility regulation and legislative matters. He was reappointed to the UCB by Governor Polis on March 5, 2020, and was elected the chair of the UCB in July 2020.
Mr. Steele recently co-authored with Paul Alvarez a publication in the Electricity Journal titled “Price Cap Electric Ratemaking: Does it Merit Consideration?”
Mr. Steele has also appeared on a number of occasions as a guest speaker before the National Association of Regulatory Utilities Commissioners Staff Subcommittee on Accounting and Finance.
Mr. Steele received his Bachelor of Science Degree in Business Administration from the University of Northern Colorado and his MBA degree from the University of Phoenix.