Why Keeping Hydrogen Out of Easily Electrifiable Sectors Matters

Is hydrogen a clean energy source?

It depends. Hydrogen does not release greenhouse gas emissions when it is used, so, similar to electricity, what really matters from a climate perspective is how the hydrogen is produced. That can range from very dirty to very clean. The vast majority of hydrogen used today is made from natural gas and produces a lot of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Hydrogen produced in this manner is often referred to as “gray hydrogen.” There are also methods of producing “green hydrogen,” most notably by using renewable electricity to break water into hydrogen and oxygen through a process known as electrolysis. But, regardless of how hydrogen is produced, emerging research has found that – just like natural gas – hydrogen that leaks directly into the atmosphere is damaging to the climate.

What is hydrogen’s current role in our economy?

Today, hydrogen is used in industrial processes like oil refining and fertilizer production. In recent years, there has been expanded focus on the potential for using hydrogen to help decarbonize other sectors of the economy including power generation, transportation, and the natural gas distribution system. The question of whether to blend hydrogen into the natural gas distribution system to reduce the overall GHG emissions associated with using natural gas has been a particular hot button issue across the country, and particularly in the northeast.

Why is hydrogen suddenly a hot topic in the Northeast?

Many of the gas utilities in the Northeast have proposed hydrogen blending as a core strategy in their decarbonization plans and some are actively pursuing hydrogen blending pilot projects. The appropriate use of hydrogen was a key point of debate in the Massachusetts Future of Gas docket and four northeastern states (New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Massachusetts) have partnered to pursue a portion of the $8 billion of funding available through the Department of Energy to create a “regional hydrogen hub.”  Hydrogen is a central point of discussion in the currently underway updates to Connecticut’s Comprehensive Energy Strategy and Connecticut recently formed a Hydrogen Task Force to study hydrogen’s role in the state’s economy and energy infrastructure. Hydrogen will also undoubtedly be a focal point in Rhode Island’s own “Future of Gas” docket that recently kicked off.

What are the key problems and limitations associated with hydrogen?

Even if hydrogen is “green” (i.e., produced with 100% renewable electricity), it still faces a number of issues and limitations. Perhaps most importantly, most experts agree that hydrogen can only safely replace 7% of the total energy flowing through the gas distribution system, dramatically limiting any potential climate benefit of hydrogen blending. We still need to decarbonize  the other 93%. How? Gas companies have proposed replacing the remaining natural gas with so called “renewable natural gas” which is extremely problematic.

Additionally, the process of producing green hydrogen is inefficient and requires a huge amount of renewable electricity. As a result, for most sectors of the economy, it makes more sense to use clean electricity to “directly electrify” those sectors, rather than adding the inefficient middle step of converting that clean electricity to hydrogen. For example, using clean electricity to run a heat pump for heating a home is about five times more efficient and significantly more cost effective than using that same clean electricity to produce green hydrogen, blend that hydrogen into the gas system, and then burn that hydrogen in a boiler.

Because green hydrogen requires so much clean electricity to produce, producing green hydrogen at scale would require a ton of land to site the wind turbines and solar panels. We simply will not have enough land to produce green hydrogen at the scale necessary to decarbonize the whole economy. The limited green hydrogen we will have should be allocated to the sectors of the economy that are hardest to electrify, like aviation, shipping, and certain industrial processes. It is critical to use this limited resource strategically, and not waste it in sectors of the economy that are relatively easy to electrify, like building heating and passenger vehicle transportation.

Are there safety concerns associated with hydrogen?

Hydrogen does present unique safety challenges. It is the smallest molecule in the universe and is prone to leaks, highly combustible, and burns with a nearly invisible flame. So, while hydrogen is relatively safe in an industrial facility where trained professionals can constantly monitor the equipment, it does pose significant safety risk when you consider scenarios like people burning hydrogen in a furnace at their home.

What are the alternatives to hydrogen and why should we use them?

It is going to depend on the sector. As mentioned before, there are sectors of the economy that are exceedingly difficult to electrify such as shipping, aviation, certain industrial end uses, and chemical production. We are almost certainly going to need some amount of green hydrogen to decarbonize these sectors, but for many parts of the economy the main alternative is direct electrification using technologies like heat pumps and electric vehicles. For cars and home heating in particular, direct electrification is the superior alternative from basically any angle you can think of: Cost, efficiency, safety, and overall practicality.

Why should people be concerned about the gas company proposals to blend in hydrogen?

Direct electrification of homes using heat pumps and electric water heaters is a more cost-effective and safer means to decarbonize homes and save consumers money. Allowing gas utilities to blend hydrogen into the gas distribution system is a short-sighted decision that will only marginally reduce greenhouse gas emissions, cost ratepayers money, and distract from the more practical solution of electrification.

How do Acadia Center’s CLEAN-E and Beyond Gas Initiatives address these concerns?

Acadia Center is actively engaged in discussions around hydrogen in various forums  in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. Acadia Center is leveraging our technical expertise related to hydrogen and our analytical capabilities to question modeling assumptions through independent quantitative analysis, develop detailed public comments, present to state agencies, and educate partners. Acadia Center is also a member of the Connecticut Clean Energy Task Force Hydrogen Uses Working Group. Throughout all these processes, Acadia Center is providing technical analysis and research to demonstrate the limitations of using hydrogen in the gas distribution system and the benefits of electrification paired with energy efficiency.

How can people act on this and push for renewable, efficient sources of energy?

There are a few ways for people to get involved. You can write a letter or call your congressperson and advocate for hydrogen to be left out of the easy-to-electrify sectors like home heating and light-duty transportation. Additionally, weatherizing and electrifying one’s home with heat pumps and electric water heaters would lower demand for natural gas. The Inflation Reduction Act has made weatherizing our homes far more affordable, and you can learn more about that here.

For more information:
Ben Butterworth, Director of Climate, Energy, and Equity Analysis, bbutterworth@acadiacenter.org, 617-742-0054  ext. 111

A wind project promised Mass. cheap power. Then came inflation

There’s more drama in the ongoing saga with Massachusetts’ largest approved offshore wind project, Commonwealth Wind.

Months after its developer, Avangrid, signed power contracts with three major utilities, the company is trying to get the state’s Department of Public Utilities to allow it to renegotiate those agreements. The company says supply constraints and rising interest rates require that they charge more for their wind power if the project has a chance of being viable.

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But, by all accounts, the country — and Massachusetts — is moving forward with offshore wind, even as some of the first projects face challenges.

“We’re not seeing offshore wind failing. We’re seeing some economic turmoil and corporations trying to address the uncertainty by finding additional value for themselves,” says Melissa Birchard, director of the Acadia Center’s Clean Energy & Grid Transition program.

“Should they be allowed to get that value from renegotiating? That’s a question that’s on the table right now, but it certainly doesn’t speak to the viability of this entire industry.”

Read the full article in WBUR News here.

Three governor’s races that really matter for climate policy

Massachusetts OKs over $450M in grid modernization spending by Eversource, National Grid, Unitil

Brief:

• Massachusetts regulators gave final approval last month for Eversource, National Grid and Unitil to invest a total of more than $450 million over four years for grid modernization.
• The electric distribution companies will improve technologies for grid monitoring, communication and automation.
• Acadia Center, an environmental advocacy group, sees little emphasis on environmental justice in the grid modernization plans.

Acadia Center, an environmental advocacy group, said last year it’s concerned the proposed plans include “minimal or no mention of environmental justice principles” and that the timelines for putting in place time-varying rates are too slow.

Kyle Murray, senior policy advocate at Acadia Center, said in an email Wednesday the analysis for the most part “still holds.”

Read the full article at Utility Dive here.

Coalition Supports New England Offshore Wind Transmission Grid Plan

New England for Offshore Wind has filed comments in response to a request for information issued by five New England states seeking information concerning the development of a networked offshore electric grid to help unlock offshore wind power in the Northeast.

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“This collaborative initiative is very exciting,” says Melissa Birchard, director for clean energy and grid transition at Acadia Center, a co-author of the coalition’s comments. “This is an innovative step forward to help secure the clean energy we need to power a reliable, modern electric system. New England and its neighbors can lead the nation in developing a networked offshore grid that maximizes the cost savings and reliability benefits of offshore wind, reduces the impacts of transmission, and forms the backbone of a future Atlantic offshore grid.”

 

Read the full article in North American Windpower here.

New England’s electric grid operator opened its doors to public participation — and got a dressing down

New England’s electric grid operator has been famously closed to the public, with most decisions happening behind closed doors, with little or no public input.

On Tuesday, yielding to years of pressure, the board of ISO New England opened its doors for the first of what it says will be an annual open meeting. What followed was an hour-long dressing down, as speaker after speaker took the grid operator to task for failing to adequately respond to the climate crisis.

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In addition to the lack of transparency, Hank Webster, the Rhode Island director of the clean energy advocacy group Acadia Center, said ISO-NE needs to better align itself with the climate policies of the states it represents. Many of the states call for achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2050, but without coordination with the regional grid, it will be hard to reach those goals.

“State policy and consumer concerns remain without a regular home in the ISO New England process and decisions,” Webster said.

Read the full article in The Boston Globe here.

How to save money and protect New England from rolling blackouts, according to Acadia

Early in December 2021, ISO-New England, the region’s electric grid operator, issued a warning on the outlook for the coming winter, describing New England’s power system as being at “heightened risk heading into the winter season.”

For Melissa Birchard and Amy Boyd, both of the Acadia Center in Rockport, Maine, warnings like this have a straightforward solution: decrease reliance on natural gas and instead focus on renewable energy.

Birchard, director of clean energy and grid transition, and Boyd, vice president of climate and clean energy policy hosted a webinar aimed at avoiding the possibility of rolling blackouts during winter, which ISO-New England warned in 2018 could take place by the 2024-2025 winter heating season.

In the webinar, Birchard said each year New England uses at least 50% of natural gas toward electricity. On July 14, 2022, New England used 69% of natural gas for electricity.

One solution proposed by Birchard was for the state to start managing consumer demand. Although this can mean weatherization and insulation, it can also mean using large-scale commercial and industrial resources.

“It can include everything from using solar paired with batteries, to shifting the time that we do things like charge electric cars or even using electric cars and batteries to support the grid,” Birchard said. “It can also include delaying energy-intensive processes like rock-crushing processes in an industrial cement-making facility in order to help support the grid when the grid needs help.”

Birchard also suggested investing in renewable energy like off-shore energy solutions and energy storage which can reduce the need for fossil fuels in the winter.

“Pairing energy storage with offshore wind is really a sweet spot,” Birchard said. “We need a balanced portfolio of all of these things – demand management, renewable energy, energy storage – all of the clean solutions together, make a portfolio that is reliable overall and many of these solutions are already at hand or will be at hands soon.”

Solar-plus-storage is another method Birchard suggested that residential homes can use to lower their natural gas usage. Solar-plus-storage operates similarly to a power plant, Birchard said, in the sense, you can turn up or down the resource when needed.

“While solar isn’t that strong in the winter, as it is in the summer, it can still provide substantial electricity even in the winter when it’s cold. And we need to stop thinking of solar-plus-storage, but also other types of residential demand resources as only summer resources and start valuing reliability benefits,” she stated.

Lastly, Birchard suggested switching to the use of heat pumps and renewable energy resources in residential homes to lower fossil fuel usage.

This winter energy bills are expected to increase as the state’s largest energy suppliers Eversource and National Grid have increased their rates. Boyd suggests that consumers sign up for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program. LIHEAP is, “a federally funded program administered by the states that can provide assistance to low-income households that are seeking help with their energy bills,” Boyd said.

Boyd also suggested homeowners work with their utility provider to help lower their energy bills.

“They often will offer payment plans to help residents who are struggling with their bills,” Boyd said. “But it’s important to note that that protection is temporary, will eventually go the full amount of the bill, unfortunately.”

Read the article at Mass Live here.

The Third RGGI Program Review Should Advance Equitable Investments and Climate Goals

The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) is a market-based, cap-and-invest greenhouse gas reduction effort among the states of Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Virginia. RGGI has been a pioneer of climate policy since its founding in 2009, generating $5.6 billion in proceeds for participating states over the last 13 years. 

Every five years or so, RGGI undergoes a program review, giving the participating states the opportunity to consider the program’s performance and make various changes including the equitable disbursement of the program’s proceeds. RGGI’s third Program Review is happening now and will last through 2023. In addition to securing effective greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets, Acadia Center is advocating that the current review process focuses on returning proceeds to the environmental justice (EJ) communities that host a major share of fossil fuel infrastructure but that have not received a proportionate share of clean infrastructure benefits. Together with EJ organizations and other partners across the RGGI footprint, we are also spotlighting improvements needed to RGGI’s market-based mechanisms to provide both greater resilience to the program and optimize emission reductions. 

Ensuring Equitable Investment 

The RGGI Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) is the framework for all states to participate in RGGI, signed by the governors of each participating state. However, the MOU does not impose any requirement for the states to guarantee the equitable investment of the monetary proceeds from the emissions auctions operated under the cap and trade program, which aims to stabilize and reduce emissions while remaining consistent with overall economic growth and a safe and reliable electric power supply. Most of the participating states lack procedures to ensure RGGI-funded investments deliver meaningful and proportional benefits to overburdened and underserved communities. Many states invest RGGI proceeds into clean energy projects that, while effective in reducing climate pollution, fail to address inequities that are a legacy of dirty energy as well as inequities that continue to arise as part and parcel of the clean energy transition. In other cases, RGGI funds have been used to fill state budget gaps, addressing neither climate nor justice imperatives. 

During the second RGGI Program Review in 2017, Acadia Center, environmental justice organizations, and many other partners from across the region submitted comments to RGGI1 calling on the RGGI states to require investments of RGGI auction proceeds in environmental justice communities. It has been five years since those comments were submitted, yet the RGGI program still requires no commitment from participating states to invest proceeds equitably. Since the time of these comments in the second Program Review, programs across the US have committed to environmental and energy justice including California’s 35% minimum from cap-and-invest, the federal Justice40 framework, New York’s 40% commitment from Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (Climate Act) and New Jersey’s new EJ law. But the equitable investment of auction proceeds accrued from RGGI remains a glaring work in progress for the RGGI program and should be the priority for improvement in the third Program Review.   

Soliciting and Incorporating Input from Environmental Justice Communities 

The Program Review offers another important chance for the RGGI states to make a detailed assessment of how RGGI funds are being invested in communities and work to make those investments more equitable, both through RGGI itself and through accompanying state laws. As an initial matter, RGGI must offer ample opportunity for public comment throughout the Program Review while reaching out to capture the input of key communities. The second Program Review offered a range of opportunities for participation from residents, community-based organizations, and environmental justice advocates. It is even more important for the third Program Review to incorporate the voices of communities, both through public comment opportunities and concerted community outreach. The updated Program Review timeline contemplates ongoing engagement with communities on environmental justice and equity in fall 2022, continuing through fall 2023. This outreach and engagement should be tailored to increase the understanding of the program’s achievements to date while addressing the full scope of concerns that environmental justice communities may have about the market-based cap-and-invest program, including its impacts, its mechanisms, and how its proceeds are spent. RGGI should work to increase participation by scheduling meetings at multiple times of the day, involving an interpreter in public hearings to alleviate language barriers, and translating materials into multiple languages. Additionally, the RGGI program must focus presentations on the EJ impacts of RGGI to date and investigate potential solutions, as well as make provisions to track comments and suggestions from communities of color and environmental justice communities on program changes. 

Tackling Emissions Reductions with Reforms to the Cost Containment Reserve (CCR), Price Floor, and Emissions Containment Reserve (ECR)  

To limit emissions from the electric power sector, RGGI sets an annual carbon dioxide emissions cap from all RGGI states. More recently, participating states have set individual, ever-more aggressive emission reduction targets to decarbonize the electricity sector. By 2050, most participating states will be striving for net-zero emissions. RGGI’s regional cap and market mechanisms have yet to reflect these targets. The RGGI cap and market mechanisms need to be restructured to assist states in achieving their ambitious state-level targets for decarbonization of the power generation sector.  

RGGI’s market mechanisms are outlined by the Model Rule, a set of prescribed rules that serves as the framework for the CO2 Budget Trading Program in each RGGI state. The Model Rule has undergone recurrent revisions since it was first created, and mechanisms such as the Cost Containment Reserve (CCR), Price Floor, and Emissions Containment Reserve (ECR) should be highlighted for further reform for as part of the third Program Review. 

RGGI’s Cost Containment Reserve (CCR) is a mechanism that provides the market with a ceiling price. This means that when the price of emissions allowances in an auction carried out by RGGI is equal to the CCR price, RGGI will release additional emission allowances into the market. In practice, when the trigger price for the CCR is low, the CCR can become a mechanism for polluting facilities to avoid aggressive emission reductions. The CRR has been triggered three times in RGGI’s history and the last auction that triggered the CCR was in December 2021. However, the last three auctions have narrowly avoided the CCR trigger by only a few cents, highlighting the potential future significance the CCR has in dictating the volume of emissions allowances that are released. Acadia Center advocates substantially raising the CCR trigger price, as doing so would be a step towards reducing the power sector GHG emissions in line with state-level emissions reduction targets.   

Similarly, the RGGI Model Rule sets a price floor for allowance auctions, which is the minimum price for an allowance. In 2022, the Price Floor is $2.44 per ton, with a 2.5% rate of increase each year. In RGGI’s 57 auctions since 2009, the Price Floor had only been reached 10 times with the last time being almost 10 years ago, in December of 2012. RGGI should increase the Price Floor and establish a more ambitious rate of increase closely aligned with market prices in the most recent years’ auctions. This reform will ensure that prices will stay more consistent and RGGI states will still have the proceeds necessary to encourage stable investments in renewable electricity and energy efficiency, to grow these resources and contribute to overall decarbonization. 

Since January of 2021, RGGI has implemented an Emissions Containment Reserve (ECR), a mechanism to withhold up to 10 percent of emission allowances when the market price falls below the trigger price. However, it is essential to ensure that states can make use of this mechanism in an equitable and fair manner. Acadia Center recommends that RGGI increase the ECR trigger price to reflect the aggressive emission reductions the states need to achieve. The ECR trigger price, which is currently $6.42 per ton, will only rise to $11 in 2030, a figure far below this year’s average market price. For the past three auctions, the ECR price has been twice the market price and therefore has been rendered almost irrelevant, failing to reduce emissions as designed. 

In its advocacy with the RGGI states and with RGGI, Inc., Acadia Center works with a coalition of environmental justice organizations, community-based groups, environmental and energy policy organizations, and other partners from across the RGGI footprint. Our shared objectives are to achieve more ambitious emissions cap goals, improvements in air quality – especially in overburdened and underserved communities – and a commitment from all participating states to ensure equitable investment of RGGI proceeds in environmental justice communities. We are also currently working to update our 2019 report entitled “The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative: Ten Years in Review” to include information on RGGI’s successes and opportunities from 2019 to the present. Please speak to your state energy leaders about how RGGI can better serve you and your communities – and stay tuned to the Acadia Center website for more information.  

For More Information: 

Paola Moncada Tamayo, Policy Analyst, ptamayo@acadiacenter.org, 860-246-7121 x204
Joy Yakie, Manager, Environmental Justice & Outreach, jyakie@acadiacenter.org, 617-742-0054 x110 

Connecticut Explores Performance-Based Regulation for the State’s Utilities

In August 2020, Tropical Storm Isaias left more than 1 million customers in Connecticut without power. For many customers, it took nearly a week to restore power.

Partly in response to the storm, state legislators passed the “Take Back Our Grid” Act (PA 20-5). The bill required the state’s investor-owned electric utilities, Eversource and United Illuminating, to provide credits back to customers for the delayed storm response. It also required the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA) to open a proceeding to explore and implement a new framework for how the state should regulate its investor-owned utilities.

While Tropical Storm Isaias may have been a catalyst, adopting a new approach to utility regulation—specifically Performance-Based Regulation (PBR)—has been a nation-wide conversation for years. Performance-Based Regulation includes a broad set of policy tools that regulators can use to tie utility revenues more directly to improved performance, helping to overcome outdated financial incentives.

PURA’s PBR proceeding is a key opportunity to help make utilities work better for customers.

What would it mean to improve utility performance through PBR? Regulators could, for example, require utilities to track the number of customers enrolled in time-varying rates, which have been shown to help reduce both costs and greenhouse gas emissions. Often, tracking data in scorecards leads to improved performance based simply on the pressure of public comparisons to peer companies. But if regulators felt that there was sufficient data and experience to set specific performance targets for the metric being tracked, here enrollment in time-varying rates, they could then impose either rewards or penalties (or both) according to how performance changed over time.

PURA’s PBR proceeding began in earnest in March 2022. The process is expected to last well into 2023, and possibly 2024. While this is a long proceeding, it is critical to make sure that regulators take the time to consider all potential solutions.

Acadia Center has been working closely with other advocacy groups in Connecticut, including Vote Solar, Conservation Law Foundation, and Save the Sound, to raise awareness about the proceeding and to ensure that the proceeding incorporates a broad set of interests and perspectives.

While PURA and stakeholders will figure out many details over the coming months, PURA’s overarching goals for any PBR framework in Connecticut are to 1) enhance electric distribution company performance; 2) advance public policy; 3) improve customer empowerment and satisfaction; and 4) ensure reasonable, affordable, and equitable rates.

So far, PURA has held three stakeholder workshops, each with an accompanying working paper from PURA staff to gather specific feedback from stakeholders. While later stages of the proceeding will explore performance metrics and potential rewards and penalties in more detail, the process so far has helped stakeholders develop a better sense of which regulatory tools in Connecticut are working and which are not.

As the proceeding continues, Acadia Center will work to ensure that a broad set of voices are heard and to make sure that any new regulatory tools support key public policy goals and prioritize customers.

For more information, including Acadia Center reports and an introductory webinar on PBR that Acadia Center co-hosted with Vote Solar, Conservation Law Foundation, Save the Sound, see: https://votesolar.org/resources-for-performance-based-regulation-of-connecticut-utilities/

Moving Beyond Gas in RI

Following the success of the Massachusetts-based Beyond Gas coalition, Acadia Center has formed a similar coalition in Rhode Island. Acadia Center and its partners in the Beyond Gas-RI advocacy coalition have submitted comprehensive comments to the Rhode Island Public Utilities Commission (PUC) outlining our recommendations for the forthcoming Future of Gas investigation. The proceeding, expected to unfold over the remainder of 2022 and well into 2023, will examine how the state’s overreliance on “fossil” gas must change for the state to meet the Act on Climate’s requirements of a 45 percent reduction in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2030, 80 percent reduction by 2040, and to net-zero by 2050.

The letter, signed by Acadia Center, Audubon Society of Rhode Island, the Environment Council of Rhode Island, Conservation Law Foundation, Green Energy Consumers Alliance, the Climate and Development Lab at Brown University, Sierra Club and concerned citizens, makes a series of recommendations for the scope of the proceedings.

• First, the coalition notes the General Assembly granted broad powers to state agencies to promulgate rules and regulations to achieve the GHG emissions reductions required by the Act on Climate, so the PUC has the power to make significant changes in this sector, if it finds them appropriate.
• Extensive studies have repeatedly concluded that the most favorable and realistic pathway for a decarbonized future relies primarily upon heating electrification, including thermal energy networks, rather than so-called decarbonized gases such as renewable natural gas or hydrogen.
• Beyond Gas RI urged the PUC to explore the assumptions and methodologies concerning methane leaks as a primary area of focus in light of recent utility filings that confirm repeated studies that the gas distribution system might be leaking nearly 4 percent of total “sent out” gas. Gas leaks are particularly dangerous public safety concerns and doubly problematic for the climate because methane released directly into the atmosphere has a 20-year global warming potential (GWP) that is 86 greater than carbon dioxide over the same period.
• Finally, the coalition urged the PUC to expand its usual regulatory purview to also look at health and safety implications related to gas use. Studies have repeatedly shown that gas combustion inside of buildings is linked to higher rates of respiratory illness and cardiovascular disease. Recent studies have also shown that, in addition to the pipeline leaks documented above, gas stoves routinely leak methane even while they are off — accounting for between 0.8 percent and 1.3 percent of all gas they use.

“Ultimately, the PUC’s primary focus should be to identify the most aggressive and feasible gas system decarbonization pathway that both rapidly and equitably reduces current GHG fossil gas emissions in the near-term while eliminating the potential risk of new long-lived fossil fuel connections to the network and protecting ratepayers from stranded costs.”

The PUC proceeding follows several years of Acadia Center engagement with the Public Utilities Commission, Energy Facility Siting Board (EFSB), Division of Public Utilities and Carriers, Rhode Island Attorney General, and other stakeholders across a series of dockets that highlight the imprudence of continuous gas system expansion. In 2021, Acadia Center urged the EFSB to impose a moratorium on new gas connections on infrastructure constrained Aquidneck Island while awaiting a determination on utility proposals to build new gas facilities to enable future growth. While that moratorium was not granted, the case is still pending and the EFSB did order a first ever comparative analysis of the GHG impacts of the utility’s preferred solution and all rejected alternatives. Acadia Center’s work on the Massachusetts Future of Gas proceeding, as well as Infrastructure, Safety, and Reliability (ISR) dockets, energy efficiency plans, non-pipes alternative frameworks, and intervention in the sale of the utility to PPL have all led to this critical Future of Gas investigation in Rhode Island.

For more information:
Hank Webster, Senior Advocate and Rhode Island Program Director, hwebster@acadiacenter.org, 401.276.0600 ext.402