Athol Daily News – House to take up energy bill: Location and new clean energy goals unveiled

House Democrats will push for new clean energy rules on Wednesday, introducing a bill late in the session that would change the way new energy projects are approved in Massachusetts and seek to boost megawatts of renewable energy production.

The House has produced a 97-page bill (H 4876) that largely mirrors the Senate-approved bill to update the siting and permitting process but expands the scope to include new areas of procurement while leaving intact some Senate plans, such as updating the state’s bottle deposit law.

A spokesman for House Speaker Ron Mariano confirmed the House will take up the bill in a formal session scheduled for Wednesday. If it passes, as expected, House and Senate Democrats will have two weeks of formal deliberations to hammer out a compromise on a difficult issue that has one top senator already expressing concerns about his counterpart’s changes.

Location of the “largest element”

The “biggest piece” of the House bill, according to its chief architect, Rep. Jeff Roy, is the area where the branches overlap the most: simplifying the process of choosing where new clean energy infrastructure will be built and speeding up permitting decisions.

Roy said current law does not set any hard deadlines for permitting clean energy projects, forcing some deliberations to extend for more than 10 years because developers must obtain a range of different permits.

“If we realistically want to create this infrastructure, it can’t take even a decade to build these key elements,” he said in an interview.

The bill would consolidate state, regional and local permits for larger clean energy projects into a single permit issued by the Energy Facilities Siting Board. Decisions on those permits must be issued within 15 months of the application deadline. Smaller project developers could also submit a similarly consolidated application, with a decision required within a year.

Utilities, energy producers and regulators largely agree that the current process for siting and permitting new clean energy infrastructure is too complex and slow, especially as Massachusetts works to rebuild its grid to accommodate the clean energy resources needed to meet net-zero emissions targets by 2050.

The Healey administration helped develop zoning and permitting reforms in House and Senate bills with input from top legislators.

Roy said the new rules complement those changes with provisions aimed at increasing the use of strategies such as advanced measurement and grid efficiency technologies, or GET.

“To meet our long-term emissions reduction goals, the House will vote this week on legislation to expand our clean energy supply by setting new targets for renewable energy procurement and storage and streamlining the permitting process at the state and local level, building on the work the Legislature has done in recent years to modernize the commonwealth’s power grid and combat the climate crisis,” Mariano said in a statement.

New Clean Energy Goals

Other parts of the House bill have less in common with the version senators approved last month by a vote of 38-2.

The House Ways and Means Committee bill, which was up for a vote Tuesday, would call for a new purchase of 9.45 million megawatt-hours of clean energy, which could come from a variety of sources, including existing nuclear generation. It also seeks to purchase 5,000 megawatts of energy storage, which Roy said would be necessary to keep the state powered by clean sources like solar and wind on days when “the sun’s not shining or the wind’s not blowing.”

None of these measures were included in the Senate bill.

Caitlin Peale Sloan, vice president of the Conservation Law Foundation of Massachusetts, said she sees the new order for 9.45 million megawatt-hours as “basically a reboot of Act 83D,” referring to an existing piece of state law.

Peale Sloan said she was “disappointed” by the House bill, which would effectively allow utilities to select winning bids for new clean energy rather than the state Department of Energy Resources, a return to the previous status quo. “We lost a lot of time because utilities were in the driver’s seat under 83D,” she said.

The House bill also rolls back Senate-approved changes to the wind energy acquisition process and instead tasks DOER with studying and recommending updates by the end of the year. Roy said he felt “uncomfortable” with the language proposed by senators, arguing that “there was never a hearing” where the public could provide input.

Peale Sloan said the final compromise bill will likely address “several difficult issues in the clean energy transition,” but predicts it will “still (be) the tip of the iceberg.” Environmental activists will continue to push lawmakers in the next term to focus on moving away from fossil fuels in buildings, heating and motor vehicles, she said.

Consumer Protection Concerns

Senator Michael Barrett, the Senate’s point man on energy policy, said Tuesday morning that he became concerned after a quick read of the House bill, noting that the House had “emphasized the business side, and on the consumer side, the consumer side.”

“There seem to be few safeguards for consumers. That means significant increases in electric bills without any compensating reductions in gas bills. There’s nothing to prevent another 30-year-old gas pipe from being buried in the ground; we’re going to pay for that forever,” he said. “The zoning and permitting means big money for utilities and big bills for all of us. You don’t want to just do it and call it a day.”

Barrett said when the Senate passed an energy and climate bill in May that Massachusetts cannot avoid paying to upgrade the grid to handle more renewable energy, and that provisions in the Senate bill that change gas utility investment programs and limit some expansions are key to stemming the skyrocketing overall energy costs for residents.

“You can safely reduce your gas bill and save people from having to pay for infrastructure that will require higher bills for 30 years on the gas side. You can reduce your gas bill by increasing your electricity bill… but without trade it becomes a big headache for household budgets,” he said.

The Lexington Democrat has warned for years that a focus on electrification without adequate ratepayer relief could turn residents away from clean energy policies, especially given the state’s already high electricity prices. On Tuesday, he said that danger “gets bigger as Trump gets stronger.”

Despite concerns, Barrett said he believes a deal is still possible.

“The House is running very late, which complicates things, but I think there is a chance,” Barrett said. “We would have to meet in person and finish it section by section. You’re talking about a marathon, but I think we can do it.”

Roy said he was “confident” he and Barrett would be able to quickly work out a compromise bill as the July 31 end of formal sessions approaches.