Research on issues of interest to the members of the Institute and the broader regulatory community.

The Institute has started a working paper series in 2007. The first two papers in this series are listed below:

The State of Competition in the Natural Gas Industry, Josh Clancy, April 2007

Barriers to Adoption of Renewable Energy Technology. Jeremiah Doner, May 2007

Faculty associated with the Institute conduct research on a variety of issues in the areas of electricity, natural gas and telecommunications. The current Institute faculty are listed below with their recent research.

David G. Loomis is associate professor of economics at Illinois State University where he teaches on the economics of telecommunications, regulatory economics and antitrust law, and industrial organization. His first edited book with Lester Taylor, titled The Future of Telecommunications: Forecasting and Demand Analysis was released by Kluwer Academic Publishers in November, 1999. His second edited book with Lester Taylor, titled Forecasting the Internet was published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 2002. He published "Active Market Share: Measuring Competitiveness in Retail Energy Markets," co-authored with Eric Malm in Utilities Policy.

Dr. Lon Carlson started as the Director of Outreach with the Institute in July, 2005. Dr. Carlson is an Associate Professor and the Undergraduate Program Director in the Department of Economics at Illi-nois State University. He received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with emphasis on environmental and natural resource economics,
and economic analysis of law. Prof. Carlson has coauthored articles that have appeared in several outlets, including the Journal of Economic Education, the Natural Resources Journal, the Boston College Environmental Affairs Law Review, and the Journal of Applied Economics Letters. Dr. Carlson also has been a coinvestigator on a number of major funded research projects,
including a study of hazardous waste regulations and policy options for solid waste management conducted for the Illinois Department of Energy and Natural Resources, and research for the Northern Illinois Alliance to Support Least-Cost Utility Planning. In addition to his current position
in the Department of Economics at Illinois State University, Dr. Carlson has held positions
with the Institute for Regulatory Policy Studies (and its predecessor Center for Regulatory
Studies), Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), and the U.S. General Accounting Office, and has worked as a consultant for a number government agencies.