​​On January 15, 2021, NRECA joined APPA, EEI, and LPPC in filing an amicus brief with the DC Circuit of Appeals regarding DOE’s final rules on Critical Electric Infrastructure Information (CEII) issues.  DOE’s final rule stipulated how it would designate, protect, and use voluntarily shared CEII from the electric industry.  NRECA generally agreed with the final rule and DOE satisfactorily addressed most of our NOPR comments.  The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) sought rehearing seeking to make most CEII publicly available through FOIA, and a few other issues.  We asked DOE to reject the UCS arguments and in their order on rehearing, they did just that.  However, UCS decided to file an appeal with the courts with the same arguments they used in their rehearing request.  The joint trade associations are again asking the courts to reject the UCS arguments in order to protect information that we voluntarily submit to DOE.