Dr. Nidhi R. Santen is a Program Manager in the Energy Systems and Climate Analysis Group at EPRI. She manages Program 178 on Resource Planning for Electric Power Systems and Project Set 178B on Integrated Energy Planning. Her primary research areas include long-term electricity sector resource planning, risk analysis and investment decision-making under uncertainty, and environmental and technology policy analysis.

Before joining EPRI, Dr. Santen worked at the MIT Energy Initiative on low-carbon electricity infrastructure planning, electricity market design, and hybrid modeling of economy-wide and electric power systems modeling tools. She also worked as a research fellow and project manager with the Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, where she improved how uncertainty and technological change are represented within long-term energy planning models. For over a decade prior to that, Dr. Santen worked on electricity planning and environmental issues across industry, consulting, and non-governmental research organizations including CPS Energy, Synapse Energy Economics, and the National Academy of Sciences.

Nidhi holds a Ph.D. in Engineering Systems from MIT, an M.S. and M.P.A. in Atmospheric Science and Environmental Policy from Indiana University-Bloomington, and a B.A. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Claire Coleman was nominated by Governor Ned Lamont, effective December 3, 2021, to serve as Consumer Counsel for the State of Connecticut. She was confirmed by the Connecticut Senate in March, 2022

Coleman formerly served as the Undersecretary for Legal Affairs for the Office of Policy and Management (OPM), where she provided legal and policy advice related to the formulation and implementation of public policy for the State and worked with the Governor’s legal team and the Attorney General’s Office on litigation and legal matters.

Coleman previously worked as an energy attorney at Save the Sound (formerly Connecticut Fund for the Environment), and as counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives Oversight and Government Reform Committee, where she conducted investigations into both private business practices and government programs and regulations, and prepared members of Congress for hearings on many areas of government policy and practice, including energy and environmental regulation. She also worked as a litigation associate at Wiggin and Dana LLP in New Haven and Sullivan and Cromwell LLP in New York, and served as law clerk to the Honorable Ellen Bree Burns, United States District Judge for the District of Connecticut.

Claire is a graduate of  Cornell University and Northwestern University School of law.  Between college and law school, she served as a Team Leader for the Americorps National Civilian Community Corps.

In 2020 the Connecticut Conference of Municipalities honored Claire as a Municipal Champion for her work on emergency COVID-19 pandemic Executive Orders that impacted and supported local governments. The Connecticut Law Tribute recognized Claire with a New Leaders in the Law award in 2016, and she has received several awards for pro bono legal work.