Massachusetts Lawmakers Focusing on Energy Affordability in 2025

In the wake of skyrocketing energy costs over the past winter and the loss of federal support for state clean energy initiatives, Massachusetts policymakers are facing difficult questions about balancing decarbonization with energy affordability in the state’s 2025/26 legislative session.

While lawmakers and advocates are quick to support the idea of energy affordability, in practice, the concept can motivate widely ranging policies with varying effects on decarbonization efforts.

Kyle Murray, director of state program implementation at the Acadia Center, said he would like to see the energy affordability bill include limits on utilities’ return on equity (ROE), potentially restricting ROE to an average of the surrounding Northeast states.

“Our position has long been that utility return on equity is really inflated and could serve to come down a few points,” Murray said, while also acknowledging that passing ROE reforms would be challenging due to the complexity of utility ratemaking and likely opposition from investor-owned utilities.

Murray also said he hopes lawmakers will consider changing the funding mechanism for some programs currently funded through volumetric charges in electricity and gas rates. He said funding programs like low-income discounts, Mass Save and renewable energy charges through fixed bill charges or through the tax base could save most ratepayers money.

He also expressed interest in legislation limiting the expansion of the state’s gas network, a priority shared by Mass Power Forward, a large coalition of climate and environmental justice groups.

To read the full article from RTO Insider, click here.

Utility companies target heat pump incentives for cuts to pare back Mass Save budget

After state officials reduced Mass Save’s proposed budget by $500 million in February, the utility companies that run the energy efficiency program have proposed a new pared down compliance plan with the largest cuts coming to incentives for heat pumps and a program that provides a one-stop shop for residents looking to weatherize and invest in electrification upgrades.

“These cuts represent some of the best options of bad options,” said Kyle Murray, a member of the council and the Massachusetts program director at the Acadia Center, a non-profit research and advocacy organization dedicated to combating climate change.

The Mass Save program – which helps homes and businesses become more energy efficient and reduces greenhouse gas emissions – is funded through a surcharge on electricity and gas bills. After gas bills spiked across the state due to an unusually cold winter and the increase in the Mass Save surcharge, the DPU decreased the budget for the program from the proposed $5 million to $4.5 million. The DPU directed that the cut come from programming for the residential sector.

Environmentalist advocates including Murray called the move “short-sighted,” saying that the cut will result in increased costs for residents in the long run.

To read the full article from Commonwealth Beacon, click here.

What’s that charge for? We’re breaking down your utility bills

Many of us saw crazy high home-heating bills this winter. Massachusetts energy bills were already among the highest in the country.

Now, as we approach the hottest months of the year, we know many of you are paying close attention to your utility bills. Do you ever look at those bills and wonder what all those charges are?

“I think people really want to know what goes into their bills,” said Kyle Murray, Director of State Program Implementation for the Acadia Center–a non-profit focused on renewable energy.

Murray agreed to sit down with Kavanaugh and go line by line through some energy bills, breaking them down, dissecting each of the charges.

Electric Bill Itemization

The first charge listed on an electric bill is the Customer Charge.

“That is basically the charge of meters,” said Murray. And the cost for utility companies to read those meters, fixed usually at $10 a month.

The Distribution Charge is the cost of carrying power from substations to your home.

“The stuff that’s in state that’s carrying it from substation to your home. Think those smaller poles and wires,” said Murray.

Murray says think of the Transmission Charge as the cost of big towers carrying power across the region.

Not to be confused with the Transition Charge which allows utilities to recover assets stranded after energy restructuring decades ago. Oddly, that can appear as a negative charge.

The Energy Efficiency Charge funds the Mass Save program–funding rebates and incentives to make homes more efficient. Murray says that has benefitted ratepayers whether they use the program or not.

“Because of the fact that Mass Save has been such a successful program, I believe the numbers around, we’ve reduced our energy build out that we would have had to do by about 20%. So that’s a lot of savings that are delivered, even if you’ve never used the program at all,” Murray said.

Next is the Renewable Energy charge.

“So, the renewable energy charge goes to a trust fund that funds the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center. And they are focused on clean energy innovations,” said Murray.

Don’t have solar? You still have two charges associated with it.

The Net Meter Recovery Charge –goes to homes with solar power producing more energy than they consume

The Distributed Solar Charge–provides consumers with incentives to install solar on their homes.

“It is efficiency measures for your home,’ Murray said. “It’s not generation side for your homes.”

And the Electric Vehicle Charge funds the state’s electric vehicle program.

The Ratepayer Debate

“I couldn’t believe that I’m getting charged for electric cars and solar panels, which I don’t have neither one of them,” said Massachusetts ratepayer Carmen Lopez.

Lopez echoes a sentiment of some ratepayers and that of the conservative non-profit, the Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance, which advocates for government and fiscal transparency and accountability.

“I would slash them [charges] all,” said Paul Craney, the executive director of the alliance. “I mean as a consumer if you want to pay for these projects, you certainly can but a lot of people don’t want to play for these projects.

Craney said the markets should decide whoever can produce the best product at the cheapest cost and consumers should choose what they want.

Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance blames high energy bills in part on the state’s push for electric energy.

“It all comes back to a bill, a law that was passed in Massachusetts, the Global Warming Solutions Act,” Craney said. “And so, as ratepayers, people who pay these bills, we are now starting to fund these mandates. We’re just in the beginning phase of how expensive this is going to become on the ratepayers.”

Craney argues natural gas is a more reliable energy source, and often a cheaper one.

Murray, with the Acadia Center, disputes that.

“No, it’s not always the cheapest. And in many cases investing in renewables such as solar or wind or hydro come in significantly cheaper at those moments and that’s why it’s really important to have a mix of fuels rather than just going all in on natural gas which is what we kind of did in the past,” Murray said. “You’re subject to the whims of the market when if production is down, prices can spike. Or if demand goes up, prices spike. So, this ends up with the consumer not necessarily knowing what their bill is going to look like due to things that are largely out of their control and largely out Massachusetts’ control too.”

But Murray says there should be a conversation about what programs fall to the ratepayer in their monthly utility bill.

“We can’t keep putting programs on the backs of rate payers. It’s just not sustainable in the long-term,” Murray said. “I think additionally we can start looking at what goes into the bill and determining should this be volumetric or should this maybe be a fixed charge or should it altogether maybe be removed from the bill, and put into the tax base somewhere.”

To read the full article from Boston 25 News, click here.

An Earth Day Message from Acadia Center

Since its creation in 1970, Earth Day has been a time to celebrate the earth and take action to sustain and protect it. The creation of the conservation movement in the United States is credited to a Republican president, Theodore Roosevelt, who founded the US Forest Service, established over 200 million acres of public lands including 150 million acres of national forests, created national monuments like the Grand Canyon, and advanced sustainability as a concept for resource management. Bipartisanship was a hallmark of Earth Day’s creation, and bipartisanship marked the numerous foundational advances made in 1970: the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and passage of the Clean Air Act and soon after the Clean Water Act, which improved the health and quality of life of all Americans.

The community of conservation, environmental, clean energy, climate and environmental justice organizations has made outsized contributions to the quality of American life. They are supported by tens of millions of Americans in all 50 states who seek clean water, clean air and a safe and healthy future. The vast majority of Americans embrace the consumer and air quality benefits of modern clean energy technology: 66% of Americans support moving to a 100% renewable energy future and 74% support regulating carbon dioxide as a pollutant.

Clean air, clean water, safe and clean housing, good transportation options and a future not blithely tossed to the risks of a rapidly changing climate, are in the interest of people no matter their politics.

The original Earth Day arose from being witness to the damage a fossil fuel economy poses to human health and the environment: massive oil spills off the coast of Santa Barbara, California, toxic air pollution damaging the health of people, and the Cuyahoga River on fire in Cleveland in 1969. Fast forward from 1970 to now, scientific ingenuity – based in U.S. research institutions and the business sector, supported by vital government research and development support – has spearheaded technology improvements in clean energy that offer consumers, utility ratepayers, communities, homeowners and businesses, a vast array of affordable, cost-effective low and non-polluting options. They will move forward because they make economic and common sense.

On this Earth Day, Acadia Center is re-doubled in its commitment to offer effective, fact-based clean energy solutions that will improve the lives and pocketbooks of all. We celebrate the nation’s conservation, clean energy, environmental protection and environmental justice organizations diligently working to improve the lives of all – and exercising their rights to free expression that the U.S. Constitution guarantees us. We celebrate the many dedicated federal energy and environmental workforces across agencies like EPA, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Energy Health and Human Services (HHS), and many others, who are now under attack, diminishing the nation’s capacity to provide programs and information critical to the public good.

Acadia Center, its staff and board, are proud of the work we do and the efforts we contribute to make energy and transportation systems cleaner more affordable, and available to all. We are proud of being part of the nation’s conservation, environmental, climate and environmental justice advocacy community. We celebrate Earth Day, thank our supporters and donors whose partnership is a source of strength, and honor the work of all who have fought for and are fighting for a healthier, vibrant future for all.

Attorney General Andrea Campbell’s big question on climate

Consumer shock at high energy bills this frigid winter sent Gov. Maura Healey and Massachusetts policymakers scrambling to ease the burden.

State regulators cut by $500 million the proposed budget for MassSave, an energy efficiency program for consumers interested in help buying heat pumps and electric vehicle equipment. Utility companies agreed to lower residential bills by 10 percent in March and April, with eyes on still getting their money through bills later in the year, when heating bills are typically lower.

The Acadia Center, a nonprofit supportive of clean energy and backed by foundations like the Barr Foundation and the Merck Family Fund, named for the heir to the pharmaceutical fortune, hit back at the report, saying the groups relied on “questionable” calculations that “vastly” inflate the cost of the clean energy transition. The report also “ignores the impossibly high cost of business-as-usual,” the Acadia Center said. “New Englanders withdraw billions of dollars out of the regional economy each year to purchase fossil fuels sourced outside New England.”

To read the full article from Commonwealth Beacon, click here.

Massachusetts heat pump owners could pay less for electricity next winter

Nearly 3 million Massachusetts households will have the chance to start saving money on heating next winter under new seasonal heat-pump rates from the state’s three major electric utilities.

In the winter, though, average demand is much lower, so the strain on the grid is much lighter. During these months, the delivery charge doesn’t properly reflect the actual costs of keeping the grid running, said Kyle Murray, Massachusetts program director for clean energy nonprofit Acadia Center.

Households that operate heat pumps in the winter are ​“not actually putting much stress on the system at all,” he said. ​“They really shouldn’t have to pay as much as they are.”

To read the full article from Canary Media, click here.

Environmental Justice in an Era of Federal Rollbacks: What States Can Do

Recently, environmental injustice and energy inequity issues have gained greater mainstream attention across the U.S. This is partly due to the efforts of the Trump Administration to dismantle the recent momentum of environmental justice policy in the last few years and the longer legacy of environmental justice from decades prior. Under the Biden Administration, many significant strides were made on environmental justice policy. Some of those commitments included instituting the first White House Environmental Justice Advisory Council in 2021, revamping the White House Environmental Justice Interagency Council (IAC), and introducing Justice40—an initiative aimed at supporting disadvantaged communities by directing 40 percent of overall climate and clean energy investment by the federal government to those communities; amongst other initiatives. Today, these programs to advance environmental justice at the federal level have been halted, along with many related vital funding priorities.

When the federal administration changed on January 20, 2025, many anticipated the nation’s climate and clean energy progress would be threatened. However, the swiftness of the rollback on energy equity and environmental justice was not as widely predicted. Three successive executive orders (E.O.) have already been issued dismantling the environmental justice and energy equity progress of the Biden Administration and prior administrations, including:

• O. 14148: “Initial Rescissions of Harmful Executive Orders and Actions”
• O. 14173: “Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity,” and
• O. 14151: “Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing.”

E.O. 14148 revokes the previous administration’s E.O. 13985, “Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government,” and E.O. 14096, “Revitalizing Our Nation’s Commitment for Environmental Justice for All,” among other revocations. These changes abruptly stopped significant commitments that had been propelling environmental justice and energy equity leadership within federal agencies. These halted activities include several prominent environmental justice-oriented policies and programs to alleviate energy burdens, broaden access to clean energy measures, and ensure environmental justice.

These efforts to uproot environmental justice and equity are perhaps only one front among a more extensive set of issues facing the fight for a clean energy future. The single largest federal investment for climate and clean energy, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), passed into law by the previous administration and Congress to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and accelerate the adoption of clean energy, has also endured attacks. Many investments provided through the IRA law were initially halted via an immediate funding freeze directed by the President and advanced by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) – but now seem to be trickling funding out following court decisions.

With mandates removed from federal agencies through multiple executive orders and downsizing, efforts to promote energy equity, environmental justice, and climate solutions rely heavily on state actions and commitments. Greenhouse gas emissions and environmental pollution issues do not cease to exist because they are not being addressed at the federal level; quite the opposite. A lack of federal leadership may slow progress, but states and regions must step up to the plate and commit to providing equitable and just solutions to climate and environmental justice within their jurisdiction. States can still take executive action and strengthen legislative authority to redouble commitments to environmental justice and lower energy costs for communities facing injustice and consumers in general. As an example of where states can take action, a recent Acadia Center report in collaboration with New York’s We Act for Environmental Justice details the excess energy burdens borne by over 2 million households in New York while outlining energy affordability programs that could address those burdens. Every state could codify similar energy burden protections for low- and moderate-income (LMI) households and enact new measures to alleviate pressure from rising utility bills.

There are many ways for states to step up and fill the gaps created by federal rollbacks on energy equity and environmental justice. These include:

• Commit to equitable funding allocation to address inequities: The Justice40 initiative instituted by the Biden Administration prioritized clean energy investments funding for disadvantaged communities nationwide. States can adopt this initiative and tailor it to meet the challenges of communities faced with pollution and other barriers to clean energy provision. For instance, states can pass legislation codifying environmental justice definitions into law that adopt similar language from the Justice40 executive order and allocate resources to create databases that emulate resources states have relied on at the federal level during the past administration(s).
• Environmental Justice Leadership and Advisory Group: Though federal leadership and vision for environmental justice are now lacking, states can continue seeking and implementing effective environmental justice leadership in their agencies and across programs. Last year, Acadia Center outlined the various equity advisory boards across the Northeast states, with the main limitation of these advisory forums identified to be a lack of mandate to execute equitable climate plans. Across the agencies, each state must work to ensure that the advisory boards are not only in place but are mandated to implement their recommendations.
• Consideration of cumulative impact and underlying equity issues: Historically, environmental justice and many frontline communities are hosts to energy infrastructure, transmission, and transportation infrastructure. Considering their exposure to various sources of pollution, state agencies across the region must establish siting and permitting mandates that consider the cumulative impact of pollution on these communities while ensuring equity, engagement, and transparency in the siting of infrastructures. Mandating community benefit plans in the regulatory or policy space for extensive energy infrastructure and codifying past federal directives into law would be essential in integrating equitable guidelines in the siting and permitting process.

In the months ahead, environmental justice and climate policy can progress if states embrace the opportunity to recommit to climate, clean energy, and environmental justice. Acadia Center has long been committed to working at the local and regional levels to shape, propose, and advocate for local, state, and regional actions that will build a cleaner, healthier, and more just economic future for all.

Stakeholders Respond to Mass. Proposal to Limit Cost Recovery for Gas Expansion

Business groups and environmental advocates expressed divergent views on a proposal by the Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities that would require new gas customers to cover the entire cost of connecting to the system.

The department’s draft policy would end the utility practice of including the costs of connecting new customers into rate base. This is currently allowed if the utility expects to recover the costs through distribution fees from the new customers over an extended period.

The AGO and a range of environmental nonprofits called for the DPU to add language establishing strict criteria for the exemptions that would allow a project’s connection costs to be covered by ratepayers.

“The draft policy should establish a clear and consistent methodology for assessing a demonstrable reduction in GHG emissions for proposed line extensions serving new construction,” wrote a coalition of environmental groups led by Rewiring America and the Acadia Center.

To read the full article from RTO Insider, click here.

Myth Busting: Congestion Pricing – Part II

Last July, Acadia Center published a myth busting blog tackling the controversial implementation of congestion pricing in New York City. Congestion is a policy designed to reduce traffic in the most congested areas of cities by charging vehicles a fee to enter designated areas. In New York, the plan imposed a charge on vehicles entering the highly congested lower part of Manhattan below 60^th Street, aiming to cut down on traffic, improve air quality, and drive people toward the readily available public transit network, all while increasing funds for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). Now that the policy has been in place for several months, it’s time to review just how effective it has been and what lessons can be learned.

So, has congestion pricing actually alleviated traffic congestion in NYC?

YES! The Congestion Pricing or Central Business District Tolling program, introduced on Jan 5, 2025, has led to noticeable and quantifiable reductions in traffic congestion within lower Manhattan.

Early numbers from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) reported that since congestion pricing began in January 2025, traffic entering Manhattan’s Congestion Relief Zone has significantly declined. Compared to historical averages:

• January 2025 saw 8% fewer daily vehicle entries, totaling 1.27 million fewer vehicles for the month.
• February 2025 saw a 12% drop, or about 2.03 million fewer vehicles.
• March 2025 saw a 13% reduction, with 2.54 million fewer vehicles compared to baseline levels.

These sustained month-to-month reductions in traffic entering lower Manhattan suggest that congestion pricing effectively decreases traffic. Although some worried that congestion pricing would simply shift traffic to other boroughs, data shows that this hasn’t happened, there has been no noticeable increase in traffic in areas like the Bronx or Staten Island according to Streetsblog NYC.

Beyond the raw numbers, commuters and travel services have also reported improved travel speeds and increase public transit ridership. According to Better Cities, the MTA is averaging 448 thousand more public transit riders per day this year, that growth alone is nearly 50% larger than the total daily ridership of DC’s Metro, the second-busiest subway system in the U.S.

The biggest ridership growth has been in bus ridership. Since Bus speeds across the Hudson and east river entrances to Manhattan are faster, ridership has increased service has increased. According to Streetsblog NYC, buses have started to move so much faster in NYC that the MTA has had to modify the bus schedules to reflect earlier arrival times.

Since congestion pricing began in NYC, how much has it raised for the MTA?

On Feb 2025, the MTA released a statement on revenue from congestion pricing:

“Since the first-in-the-nation program began on Sunday, Jan. 5, through Friday, Jan. 31, tolls from the CRZ generated $48.66 million in revenue with a net $37.5 million putting the program on track to generate the $500 million that the MTA initially projected. The MTA will continue to report revenues from this program monthly.”

According to the MTA, revenue generated from the Congestion Relief Zone will fund some of the region’s most important transit capital projects, including:

• Accessibility improvements at over 20 stations
• Modern signal systems on segments of the A/C and B/D/F/M lines for over 1.5 million daily riders
• Hundreds of new electric buses
• Second Ave Subway Phase 2 extension to East Harlem
• Critical projects that keep our system in good working condition, such as structural repairs, power system improvements, and upgrades to bus depots.

Has there been any impact on crime rates on public transit? Has the increased use increased or decreased criminal activity in the city?

Despite the increase in subway ridership, crime on the NYC subway system has declined. According to recent NYPD data reported by AMNY, felony crimes on the subway dropped 15%, in the first quarter of 2025. There were 437 felonies recorded from January through March, compared to 515 during the same period in 2024. The data suggests that increased transit use has not led to more crime, in fact, more eyes on the street may coincide with a safer system overall. On top of that the funds from congestion pricing will likely be used to improve infrastructure and fare gates that will continue to increase safety in the system.

Will the new administration be able to force the end of congestion pricing?

The Trump administration has stated opposition to the Congestion Pricing Program in NYC, with the US transportation secretary, Sean Duffy, demanding its termination. However, the MTA has filed a lawsuit challenging the federal government’s decision. The latest reporting from ABC News mentions that “Hochul and MTA Chair and CEO Janno Lieber have said they will not turn off the tolls without a court order.”

Powering the Future: Why Transmission Planning in New England Matters for Consumers and Communities

This blog is a follow-up to the Acadia Center and National Resource Defense Council’s joint blog from September 2024, available here.

The New England region needs to plan the power grid of the future and build new transmission lines, which carry power from power plants to our homes, schools, and businesses. New transmission lines will help New England meet peak energy demand—which will double in the next century^[1]—by allowing new clean energy resources to plug in to the grid and delivering low-cost power across the region. The rate of transmission build-out needs to double by 2032 to achieve a clean energy future.^[2]

Not all transmission is created equal, and New England has a problem with too much of the wrong thing: ballooning costs for small, local transmission projects are eclipsing larger, multi-state, high-voltage projects. These small projects slip through regulatory “gaps” and have minimal oversight, costing millions just to maintain the existing system – and with little to no eye toward optimizing rebuilds for the future we need.^[3] In contrast, well-planned, large regional lines can address multiple needs at once, saving consumers money. Maintenance of the existing system is important, but it can’t discourage the region from pursuing larger, multi-value projects (i.e., bringing reliability, economic, and public policy benefits).

The New England states realized the importance of large regional transmission, coming together with the regional grid operator, ISO New England (ISO-NE), to create the new “Longer-Term Transmission Planning Process”^[4], or LTTP. This process is well underway, and ISO-NE just issued in late March 2025 its first solicitation^[5] for transmission solutions that will unlock renewable energy in northern Maine and fix longstanding bottlenecks between northern and southern New England. In Northern Maine, there is critical renewable capacity from onshore wind and solar waiting to be unbottled from existing transmission constraints – which would provide reliable, affordable renewable energy that would flow to ratepayers in Maine and the rest of the region.

A winning project will be selected based on its “benefit to cost” ratio, which must be greater than 1—in other words, benefits must outweigh costs to New England residents. The good news: the six states have already agreed on a means of sharing costs of any LTTP transmission investments based on load allocation, making it a valuable deal for any individual state. Proposals will be published in November 2025, and the ISO and states will move forward with a final selection by September 2026^[6]. The ISO and New England states are showing strong leadership, sprinting ahead of other regions to achieve state goals and build transmission that will benefit the region for generations to come.

Transmission projects need meaningful community engagement

Like any big infrastructure project, transmission lines need to consult and engage with the communities they pass through. Insufficient community engagement can exacerbate environmental justice harms and community impacts and cause projects to fail: analysis from the Niskanen Center and the Clean Air Task Force shows that local opposition has contributed to nearly 1/3 of U.S. transmission projects being delayed and/or cancelled.^[7] And, 15% of counties nationwide have passed bans, moratoria, or other regulations that effectively limit clean energy;^[8] clearly, with these sentiments on the rise, both transmission and other energy infrastructure projects are at-risk without meaningful plans to address community sentiment and preferences. New England is not immune to these trends: community opposition arose as an acute challenge during the last major procurement for new transmission lines in the region (Massachusetts’ 83D procurement in 2018)^[9]. Simply put, projects will not be successful without top-notch community engagement.

While ISO-NE’s solicitation states that it will evaluate and credit applicants who submit a community engagement plan, the RFP falls short by not requiring all applicants to submit such a plan. The ISO should solicit projects that are following best practices for community engagement. There are already examples for New England: the Northern Plains Connector project worked with local community foundations to create a community-led philanthropic distribution process^[10], and the Vineyard Wind project hired a trusted translator who spoke fluent Portuguese to communicate with the affected community.^[11]Without requiring projects to submit robust community engagement plans, the LTTP process risks falling short of its important and meaningful transmission goals.

Other Considerations

Additionally, other important elements are included within the LTTP RFP but could be bolstered, like provisions for grid-enhancing technologies and using existing rights of way. Grid-enhancing technologies encompass multiple software and hardware technologies, but currently the RFP only specifies dynamic line ratings. Grid-enhancing technologies are low-cost and high-efficiency technologies that can make existing and new transmission lines more efficient; including them and incentivizing them more, as well as integrating them with forward-looking weather projections, would make this process even more beneficial for ratepayers. There’s a similar line of thinking for rights of way – utilizing existing rights of way like highways or existing transmission corridors can streamline new transmission permitting, and the RFP could be strengthened by showing in Part 2 that project applicants will be evaluated favorably if they can show the use of an existing right of way (with a potentially faster in-service date).

Conclusion

In sum, the LTTP process is important and is worth paying attention to for the region as it moves along. Bids for the LTTP RFP will be submitted by September 2025, and a summary of the bids will be posted publicly by November 2025. It will be critical for stakeholders to pay attention to the bids selected and see how these hopefully multi-value, robust transmission proposals create a resilient and affordable energy future for the Northeast.

[1] The Energy is About to Shift – Acadia Center and Clean Air Task Force Report. The Energy is About to Shift – Acadia Center

[2] Princeton University, Zero Lab Analysis – Electricity Transmission is Key to Unlock the Full Potential of the IRA. Sept 2022. REPEAT_IRA_Transmission_2022-09-22.pdf

[3] Claire Wayner, Kaja Rebane, and Chaz Teplin, Mind the Regulatory Gap: How to Enhance Local Transmission Oversight, RMI, 2024, https://rmi.org/insight/mind-the-regulatory-gap

[4] Lang-Ree, Claire and Poplavska, Anya, Bridging the Gap: New England’s Transmission Planning and Order 1920. New England’s Transmission Planning Opportunity, September 2024

[5] https://www.iso-ne.com/static-assets/documents/100021/2025lttprfp_postingannouncement.pdf

[6] Note that some potential flexibility is allocated before and after depending on 1) the number of proposals received and 2) what proposal the states prefer

[7] A closer look at the role of litigation and opposition in transmission projects undergoing federal permitting – Niskanen Center; this analysis examined 37 total projects nationwide according to key criteria

[8] Weise, E., Beard, S., Bhat, S., Radilla, R., Procell, C., & Zaiets, K. (2024, February 27). US counties are blocking the future of renewable energy: These maps, graphics, show how. USA Today. https://www.usatoday.com/story/graphics/2024/02/04/us-renew able-energy-grid-maps-graphics/72042529007/

[9] 83D – Massachusetts Clean Energy

[10] Community Benefits Snapshot: North Plains Connector Transmission Line Community Engagement and Benefits | World Resources Institute

[11] Who is Vineyard Power? — Vineyard Power