The sections of the Virginia Code devoted to energy law present a nearly impenetrable thicket to anyone who isn’t a lawyer—and indeed, to most lawyers as well. Sentences sometimes go on for pages without a break, with clauses wrapped in other clauses like a set of Russian nesting dolls. Words don’t always mean what they do in ordinary English, but you won’t know that unless you find your way to separate sections containing the surprise definitions. And references to “Phase I” and “Phase II” utilities seem deliberately calculated to confuse. (For the record, they mean Dominion and APCo.)

Lawyers are said to like complicated and obscure language because it ensures their services remain in demand, but I’ve never met a fellow lawyer who actually subscribed to this cynical view. Most believe we are all better off when laws are easy to understand, both so we can comply and, when necessary, make reforms. This is especially true when the laws are like Virginia’s: packed with favors to powerful monopolies and riddled with booby-traps for consumers. It’s hard to change a law if you can’t make head or tail of it to begin with.

So the law firm GreeneHurlocker deserves applause for its new guide to the Virginia Code’s electric utility laws. The 33-page booklet pulls together the major relevant code sections and annotates them in clear and concise English with virtual sticky notes. Principles of Electric Utility Regulation in Virginia is not a textbook or even a primer, but something more like a travel guide, complete with a map and signposts directing the traveler to sites of particular interest.

In announcing the release of the guidebook, GreeneHurlocker lawyer William Reisinger said the intent was to provide a sort of “’Cliffs Notes’ for some of the complicated utility statutes. We have no agenda with this document, other than to help demystify some of these laws and provide some useful background.”

They’ve succeeded. Those who are used to rummaging around the online version of the Code in search of the right section to answer a particular question will find the guidebook a huge timesaver. For others who don’t even know where to begin with the Code, it offers a way in.

Perhaps most importantly, for legislators and other leaders used to relying on lobbyists to tell them what is in the Code, the guidebook will make it easier for them to do their own research.

When I first saw the guidebook, I had a momentary fear (which was also a momentary hope) that it would put my own annual “Guide to wind and solar policy” out of business as a source for policy information. As it turns out, though, the two take very different approaches and are useful for different purposes.

So you may find a use for both, but in any case you will certainly want GreeneHurlocker’s guide.