Melissa has been striving to make an impact on California's evolving climate change policies, in particular as they relate to the electricity industry. After finishing at the Nicholas School, she moved to sunny (ok not really) San Francisco and began her career as a junior analyst at the California Public Utilities Commission working to design long-term procurement plans for the utilities.  Since that time, she developed her mediation and negotiation skills by serving as one of the mediators in an 18-month negotiation process to develop a new combined heat and power program for California's investor-owned utilities.  This led to her current role as Administrative Law Judge where Melissa has presided over the case and authored the decision determining how best to allocate approximately $15 billion in revenues received by California's investor-owned utilities from California's Cap-and-Trade program.  She's looking forward to April 2014 when the first California Climate Credit will be distributed to all residential customers of California's investor-owned utilities.

When Melissa is not engaged in climate change policy, she presides over a number of other cases including complaint cases, applications for approval of power purchase agreements, transfers of control, etc.  She completed her mediation certification at UC Hastings College of the Law, and she immensely enjoys the settlement process where parties can often find creative and long-term solutions that would not otherwise be possible within the confines of the standard regulatory process.  Melissa has attended the National Judicial College in Reno, Nevada, and she strives to improve her understanding of law and regulation in California, especially as a non-attorney.