MOODY’S INVESTORS SERVICE on Tuesday issued a negative outlook for the region’s power generators in the wake of a very successful auction held last week to secure electricity supplies for New England in 2019-2020. Each year, the operator of the regional power grid holds a so-called forward capacity auction to secure electricity supplies three years […]
Environment
Posted inEnvironment
Auction yields plenty of power for 2019-2020
NEW ENGLAND POWER GRID OFFICIALS appear to be having little problem meeting future electricity demand, but most of the new power plants coming on line run primarily on natural gas, increasing the region’s reliance on fossil fuels. ISO-New England, which manages the region’s wholesale electricity market, said on Thursday that an auction conducted on Monday […]
Posted inEnvironment, The Back Story
Cape Wind mounting comeback
CAPE WIND, the controversial Nantucket Sound wind farm given up for dead last year when it lost a lucrative pair of utility contracts, is trying to mount a comeback. Jim Gordon, the energy executive who has already invested $100 million in the 15-year-old project, asked the state’s Energy Facilities Siting Board earlier this week to […]
Posted inEnvironment, Opinion
Baker right on hydropower, clean energy contracts
DAN DOLAN’S broadside against Gov. Charlie Baker’s proposal to bring additional hydropower into our electricity market reminds me of the time when the New England power generators essentially told me the lights would go out and the sky would fall if Massachusetts joined the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). That was 2007 and RGGI has […]
Posted inEnvironment, Opinion
Raise the net metering cap
MASSACHUSETTS SPENDS more than $28 billion per year on energy and electricity, with much of that money leaving the state to pay for fossil fuels from other parts of the world. Even with this mild winter, ratepayers struggle with seasonal changes that yield fluctuations in oil and natural gas prices. Meanwhile, our state’s businesses cite […]
Posted inEnvironment, State House News Service
Baker: Greenhouse gas emission target ‘achievable’
STATE HOUSE NEWS SERVICE THE LEGAL MANDATE of reducing Massachusetts greenhouse gas emissions to hit a 2020 benchmark is “achievable” if environmental policies are carried out but imperiled if the state neglects a major importation of renewable energy, according to a Baker administration report released Tuesday. The first update to the state’s clean energy and climate […]
Posted inEnvironment
Eversource, Grid submit gas pipeline contracts to DPU
THE STATE’S TWO MAJOR ELECTRIC UTILITIES are asking state regulators to approve contracts they have negotiated on behalf of their customers to purchase access to proposed natural gas pipelines. National Grid is seeking approval from the state Department of Public Utilities to enter into separate, 20-year supply contracts with the proposed Kinder Morgan and Access […]
Posted inEnvironment
Politics behind the plug
THERE IS A PATTERN that runs through the energy debate on Beacon Hill. The Baker administration wants to bring new natural gas pipelines into the region; utilities are tasked with arranging the financing. The Baker administration wants to bring hydroelectricity down from Canada; the job of soliciting bids for that work falls to the utilities. […]
Posted inEnvironment, Opinion
Bay State impresses at Paris climate conference
AFTER TWO DECADES, world leaders reached the first-ever truly global climate agreement at the United Nations climate change conference in Paris. President Obama and his fellow heads of state spoke powerfully about the need to unite to tackle climate change. Signed by 196 countries, the pact, which is scheduled to go into effect in 2020 […]
Posted inEconomy, Environment, State House News Service
Nearly 99,000 clean energy jobs in MA
STATE HOUSE NEWS SERVICE THE CLEAN ENERGY SECTOR now employs nearly 99,000 workers in Massachusetts, after five consecutive years of growth, according to a report out Tuesday from the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center. A total of 6,439 clean energy companies across the state employ 98,895 workers, representing 11.9 percent growth over last year, the 2015 […]