Advising a Utility or Grid Technology Business: A Practitioner's Guide to Metering Data, Vendor Terms, Interconnection, and Critical Infrastructure Rules
By Casey Scott McKay ·
A practitioner's guide to advising in the utility and grid technology sector, written for lawyers arriving from ordinary technology practice. It begins by establishing which client is in the chair, because a regulated utility, a technology vendor, and a distributed energy business need materially different advice. It then works through the customer data question — who holds it, who may access it, and why utility regulation rather than privacy law supplies the answer. A long central section covers vendor contracting: firmware escrow that works, patching obligations that outlive the vendor, and the recertification interaction nobody drafts for. Later steps cover interconnection and certification as a market access gate, the critical infrastructure obligations that flow down to vendors, and the regulated procurement environment. It closes with the intellectual property strategy that suits the sector and the failures that recur.
IP and Technology > Information Technology | Guide | Published 3 March 2026 - Updated 27 March 2026 | Casey Scott McKay - marksy.us
Establish which client you have
The first mistake in this sector is treating it as one practice. It is three, and the advice diverges immediately.
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