Duke Energy’S Jason Handley On Utility Policy Impacts, Grid Edge Investments, And More

Jason Handley is going to have a busy DTECH this year. It might be easier to list what he won’t be talking about.

Handley, the general manager of the Distributed Energy Group at Duke Energy, will speak on policy impacts on the utility sector, grid edge investment strategies, community and grid resilience projects, resilience benefits from DER and storage projects, and more at DTECH (formerly known as DISTRIBUTECH) convening from March 24-27, 2025 in Dallas, Texas.

Handley will speak in four sessions at DTECH, and is the chairperson for a fifth.

This session will take place on March 25 from 2:00-2:50 PM.

Every election presents potential changes in the federal and state energy landscape. In this session, panelists will dive into the dynamic world of energy and grid policy and regulation following the 2024 U.S. election. Speakers in the session will explore the possible shifts to shape the energy landscape at both federal and state levels. Hear how the election outcomes may impact grid policies and regulations through the lens of utility grid stakeholders, and policy and regulatory leads.

The industry is on a journey of strategic foresight as we navigate the intricate pathways of the evolving energy sector, share guidance, and weigh in on any new initiatives, executive orders, and agency updates, to steer through this grid modernization and digital transformative era.

Handley will be joined by Ann Moore, Industry Principal – Power & Utilities – AVEVA; Kerrick Johnson, Commissioner – Vermont Public Service; Larry Gasteiger, Executive Director – WIRES; and Jeannie Salo, Chief Public Policy Officer, North America, Schneider Electric.

This session will take place on March 26 from 4:00-4:50 PM.

The mega trends of the energy transition are introducing macro disruptors to the electric grid, including increased load demands on its aging infrastructure in conjunction with new regulations that drive faster rates of DER adoption. Today, few utilities have the visibility and situational awareness they need to manage the grid edge.

In this panel, stakeholders from several utilities — Xcel Energy, Duke Energy, and DTE Energy — will discuss how they are investing in and planning to implement new grid edge interoperability technologies to ensure reliability via distributed controls, while also coordinating with existing centralized systems and decentralized automation devices.

Xcel Energy will talk about its Grid of the Future Strategy included in their recent Distributed System Planning (DSP) filing in Colorado. 

For Duke Energy, Handley will present the company’s Carolinas resource plan that includes deploying 2.7 GW by 2031 of energy storage as flexible supply-side resources along with grid edge investments in integrated volt-var control, demand response, and energy efficiency capabilities.  

DTE Energy will discuss its 4-point reliability plan that involves foundational investments in a new system operations center, a state-of-the-art grid management system, and over 10,000 smart grid automation devices to reduce power outages by 30% and cut outage durations in half by 2029.

Handley will be joined by Zach Pollock, Director of Grid Strategy & Emerging Technology – Xcel Energy; Richard Mueller, Manager of Engineering Technology – DTE Energy; Hahn Tram, Principal – Energy IT-OT Consulting; and Stuart Laval, Director, DER Management Systems – EATON.

This session will take place on March 27 from 9:00-9:50 AM.

This session explores first-of-its-kind projects in North Carolina where utilities, community planners, and other key stakeholders are collaborating to develop community and grid resilience projects and frameworks designed to help prioritize investments aimed at enhancing reliability and advancing decarbonization efforts. The highlighted projects, known as the Resilient Renewable Energy to Diminish Disaster Impacts (REDDI) Communities initiative and Hot Springs Microgrid project, focus on making informed decisions regarding deployment of solar PV and energy storage projects for increased resilience.  Attendees will learn about the frameworks, challenges, and successes from these collaborative efforts, providing them with valuable insights and practical tools to implement similar strategies in their own regions and service territories.

This session will include detailed case studies from the North Carolina REDDI Communities project and Duke Energy’s Hot Springs Microgrid project, showcasing the collaborative strategies and innovative solutions employed to develop resilience planning frameworks and prioritize investments. The session will also offer interactive discussions and practical tools to empower attendees to apply these strategies in their own communities.

Handley will be joined by Vincent Potter, Senior Policy Analyst – North Carolina Clean Energy Tech Center; Jim Ketchledge, President – High Summit Partners; and Jared Leader, Senior Director, Research & Industry Strategy, Resilience – SEPA.

This session will take place on March 27 from 10:00-10:25 AM.

Grid resilience relates to the ability of electrical systems to anticipate, absorb, adapt to, and recover from all threats, including high-impact, low-probability (HILP) disruptions. Increasingly, utilities and regulators are seeking to include distributed energy resources (DERs) as part of the overall framework to enhance grid resilience. However, the evaluation and screening of potential projects based on the quantification of resilience benefits is a significant challenge.  While there is strong industry belief in the resilience benefits of DERs, there is no industry consensus on how to quantify and measure the value of these benefits.

As a part of its work in support of NCUC REPS, Duke Energy initiated a study to develop and apply a framework for analyzing its portfolio of potential DER projects and quantifying the resilience benefits of each project to inform project prioritization and selection of capital investment. 

This session will cover the project and the methodology developed to evaluate technical and community-based characteristics of desirable DER projects from a resilience standpoint and how Duke Energy is applying the framework in its planning and decision-making. The presentation will also discuss the application of survey-based and input-output-based techniques to quantify direct and indirect customer benefits associated with customer interruption costs.

Handley will be joined by Dileep Rudran, Vice President of Products – Open Energy Solutions, Inc.; and Dorothy Moryc, Vice-President, Engineering & Stations – Enova Power Corp.

This session, for which Handley is serving as a chairperson, will take place on March 26 from 9:00-9:50 AM.

Developing effective wildfire mitigation strategies is a high priority for utilities across North America. From larger utilities to co-ops and municipals, key steps are being taken to avert wildfires which include equipment hardening, fire resiliency assessment, advanced protection and control, and undergrounding of the electric lines to fortify distribution systems. 

In this panel, several key stakeholders are going to share their experiences in solving the complex challenges associated with wildfire mitigation. 

BC Hydro, one of the largest serving utilities in Canada, is taking steps to mitigate wildfire risks through improving asset management, line maintenance, vegetation management, and improving system operations.

NRECA Research has launched a wildfire mitigation project with a consortium of small, rural, not-for-profit electric co-ops in high fire-threat areas. They are building a Wildfire Assessment and Resilience for Networks (WARN) tool for co-op consortium members to harden their networks \and increase wildfire resilience.

Finally, Southern California Edison (SCE) has developed new approaches through external collaborations to mitigate wildfire risks. New technologies such as Early Fault Detection (EFD) and Rapid Earth Fault Current Limiters (REFCL) can sense early when a fault happens, isolate faults in time, and reduce fault energy when the protection device fails to clear the faults.

Handley will be joined by Paul Found, Distribution Specialist Engineer – BC Hydro; Souvik Chandra, Senior Specialist Engineer – Eaton Research Labs; Ravindra Singh, Senior Principal, Distribution Automation – National Rural Electric Cooperative Association; and Arianne Luy, Engineering Manager, Component Standards – SCE.

Jason Handley, P.E. is the General Manager of the Distributed Energy Group at Duke Energy. He is a respected utility industry professional based in Charlotte, North Carolina. Jason has over 28 years of utility experience specializing in the smart grid, distributed intelligence, and operations management. Jason excels at understanding the increasingly complex utility environment, managing the new digital utility workforce, and delivering on the execution and financials of technology and renewable projects. In his current role, Jason leads a team that engineers, deploys, operates, and maintains regulated distribution distributed energy resources and microgrids. In his previous role, as Director of the Emerging Technology Office, he managed a team that identified and developed new technologies impacting the electrical grid and oversaw all ongoing operational aspects of new technology pilot projects.

Attending DTECH this year? Don’t miss these other great sessions!

This list will be updated as more sessions are previewed.