Brief Biography
Richard P. O’Neill is the Chief Economic Advisor at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and a Fellow of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS). O’Neill received all three of his degrees from the University of Maryland, studying operations research with minors in mathematics, statistics, economics, and accounting. From 1969 to 1973, he taught OR and statistics at his alma mater prior to joining the computer science and business faculties at Louisiana States University.
O’Neill left academia after three years at LSU, starting a long career with federal organizations. With the Energy Information Administration in the 1970s and 1980s, he directed oil and gas analysis and oversaw the development of software systems, energy modeling systems, the analysis of natural gas markets, and forecasting methods. After a two year stint as director of FERC’s Office of Pipeline and Producer regulation in the late 1980s, O’Neill accepted directorship of the Office of Economic Policy. From 1988 to 2000, he also served as that office’s chief economist.
O’Neill has published numerous articles on the application of operations research to energy policy, power systems, and market pricing. In 1979, he coauthored a mathematical programming model for the allocation of natural gas. More recently he has focused on optimal transmission switching and the use of stochastic programming in power integration.
In 2010, O’Neill was elected a Fellow of INFORMS for his contributions to developing and applying optimization to improve the efficiency of the electricity and natural gas markets. He was additionally lauded by the society for being a vocal proponent of OR integration. O’Neill’s advocacy for applying operations research to the art of business can be seen in the numerous conferences at which he has been a keynote speaker.
Education
University of Maryland, BS, MBA, & PhD
Affiliations
Academic Affiliations
- Louisiana State University
- University of Maryland
Non-Academic Affiliations
- Energy Information Administration
- Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
- Office of Economic Policy
- Office of Pipeline and Producer Regulation
- World Bank
Key Interests in OR/MS
Methodologies
- Computer science
- Economics / Econometrics
- Forecasting
- Networks and Graphs
- Optimization/Mathematical Programming
- Probability and Stochastic Models
Application Areas
Awards and Honors
Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences Fellow 2012
Selected Publications
O'Neill R. P., Pike R., Wilkins B., & Williard M. (1979) A mathematical programming model for allocation of natural gas. Operations Research, 27(5): 857-873.
Berry C. A., Hobbs B. F., Meroney W. A., O'Neill R. P., & Steward W. R. (1999) Understanding how market power can arise in network competition: a game theoretic approach. Utilities Policy, 8(3): 139-158.
Hobbs B. F., O'Neill R. P., Rothkopf M. H., Sokiewicz P. M., & Stewart Jr W. R. (2005) Efficient market-clearing prices in markets with nonconvexities. European Journal of Operational Research, 164(1): 269-285.
Fisher E. B. & O'Neill R. P. (2008) Optimal transmission switching. IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, 23(3): 1346-1355.
Fisher E. B., Hedman K. W., O'Neill R. P., & Oren S. S. (2009) Optimal transmission switching with contingency analysis. IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, 24(3): 1577-1586.
Papasailiou A., Oren S. S., & O'Neill R. P. (2011) Reserve requirements for wind power integration: a scenario-based stochastic programming framework. IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, 26(4): 2197-2206.