Josh Gregory joined the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Indian Energy as an Engineer in September 2021. Duty stationed in Golden, Colorado, Josh serves as a technical expert supporting technical assistance and administering financial assistance awards to American Indian nations, Alaska Native villages, and tribal and intertribal organizations.
Tell us a little about your role with the Office of Indian Energy.
As an engineer and technical project officer, I see my primary role as being a guide for our grant recipients to navigate the federal financial assistance process while providing technical oversight from the Office of Indian Energy perspective. My goal with each recipient I work with is to do my best to ensure that our financial support, along with each project, is optimized so that our recipients can maximize their project’s outcomes.
What do you find most inspiring or motivating about your work?
What inspires me the most about the work we do is the resilience, the drive, and the unwavering determination of our grant recipients to take control of their resources and utilize and manage those resources-to not only secure reliable energy now, but to move toward energy independence for the benefit of generations to come.
What do you see as the greatest challenges and opportunities in tribal energy development?
Fortunately, it seems the list of challenges is shrinking due to the ever-growing strength and unwavering determination of Native nations, villages, and communities; however, the list of challenges is still unnecessarily long. These challenges include regulatory barriers, such as utility regulations that are often unfavorable to rural communities and tribal entities - and especially rural tribes. Another challenge is lack of access to financial resources, which creates an inability to develop and sustain an internal tribal energy office or program to effectively oversee planning, implementation, and management of energy resources and assets.
In terms of opportunities, the deployment of community-scale distributed clean energy resources consistently result in long-term benefits that are rapidly increasing in value; tribally owned and managed energy and distribution assets provide reliable power at a stabilized cost, while strengthening community resiliency and independence. I’d also like to acknowledge what I see and admire as a much more powerful driver of opportunities for Native communities and that is that more and more people are rightfully demanding a seat at the table and making sure they’re fully included in shaping energy policy at every level.
How do you think DOE support and funding is impacting tribal energy development?
In many ways-and certainly looking at how local governments and municipalities are solving energy-related issues-tribal energy development is at the forefront of the community-focused energy development approach, and our assistance has proudly played a part in that. There are many successful tribal energy projects that are now acknowledged nationwide as models for community-scale clean energy project development, and the resulting benefits have been immense.
Tell us about one of your favorite tribal energy projects you’ve worked on and why.
I really can’t say I have a favorite; they’re all unique and no one project is more significant than another. However, I’m partial to microgrid projects that bring community-wide electricity generation, distribution, and management under the ownership and control of tribal governments.
What do you think the future of energy looks like in Indian Country and Alaska?
I think the deployment of distributed clean energy resources and microgrids are going to continue to increase, due to the increasing need for community resiliency, stabilized energy costs, and local control. Tribal utility formation, and the formation of tribal independent power producers (IPP) will likely continue to increase as well.
When you’re not at work, what activities or hobbies do you enjoy?
When I can, I really enjoy playing instruments and making music.
Source: U.S. Dept. of Energy, Office of Indian Energy Policy and Programs