Joey Lee Miranda ’98 She guides clients in green initiatives By Natalie Missakian hen Joey Lee Miranda ’98 tells people she practices environmental and energy law, they sometimes seem disappointed that she doesn’t work for an activist organization or take on big corporations. As a partner in Robinson & Cole’s environmental and utilities practice group, Miranda represents traditional energy corporations and renewable energy companies, helping them navigate changing regulations and comply with new and existing laws. “I went into law school thinking that someday I’d work for Greenpeace, but I love what I do now,” she says. Miranda regularly appears before state regulatory agencies and helps with permits and site approvals for renewable and traditional energy projects. She also counsels companies on opportunities to earn income from renewable energy and helps them access federal, state and local funding sources. Clients range from nuclear power plant owners to clean energy firms like Danbury-based FuelCell Energy. Her view of corporations has evolved since the days when public outrage over the Exxon Valdez oil spill steered her toward environmental law. “I realized there are few, if any, companies who willfully do things to harm the environment. Now it’s really about trying to find ways to comply that still allow companies to be competitive,” she says. One of Miranda’s influences was attorney Leslie Carothers, former vice president of Environment, Health and Safety for United Technologies Corp. She convinced that company that it could reap competitive advantages by “going green.” Miranda cited as an example a New Haven printing company that installed a wind turbine to power its operations. “They got a lot of good press because they were using renewable energy.” Miranda came to practice law after stints in other fields. She earned a bachelor’s in business administration/marketing from Hofstra University, then worked in marketing and human resources, including a contract assignment with what is now Bayer Pharmaceuticals, while she pursued an MBA at UConn. Realizing how much she enjoyed learning, she enrolled in law school, working days and attending Quinnipiac at night. She finished her MBA during her summers. While at Quinnipiac, Miranda landed a summer internship in Robinson & Cole’s Stamford office, working with the late Stuart Deans, one of the state’s premier environmental lawyers. After graduation, she joined the firm’s Hartford office, where her focus switched from environmental litigation to energy. She works mostly with “competitive” energy providers, so-called merchant generators that entered the electricity market in Connecticut after deregulation forced traditional utility
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companies to sell their generating plants. She also works with retail suppliers that sell power directly to consumers. Based on her extensive work with these companies, the American Bar Association asked her to edit the book, “Capturing the Power of Electric Restructuring,” which it published in 2009. The book examines legal and policy issues in electricity law. As an industry leader, she also speaks on panels about energy topics. Her most memorable cases were in the early 2000s, when she worked on deals for two separate clients to purchase nuclear power plants in New England. “There were interesting casts of characters involved in opposing the sale of those assets,” says Miranda, who represented the buyers before the Department of Public Utility Control. “There was one person against the deal who would literally bring a skeleton and sit it in the front row every hearing day,” she recalls. She says “the crossroads of energy and the environment” is a burgeoning field that has grown in popularity under the Obama administration as the nation looks to reduce its dependence on foreign oil. Colleges and law schools are responding, she says, by offering programs tailored to the field. Aside from practicing law, Miranda loves traveling. In October, the East Hartford, Conn., resident visited South Africa and Victoria Falls. Past destinations include the Galapagos Islands, Australia and Italy. SPRING 2012 • QUINNIPIAC LAW
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