RI Energy pushes bill to let it build power plants. Critics are concerned.
Key Points
- A new bill could allow Rhode Island Energy to build and own power plants, changing a 30-year-old state policy.
- Supporters argue this would help meet rising energy demand, while critics fear it could increase consumer costs and create more of a monopoly.
- The regional grid operator, ISO-NE, has raised questions about the bill’s impact on competitive wholesale energy markets.
Thirty years ago, Rhode Island’s dominant electric utility sold off its power plants as state lawmakers moved to restructure the energy sector in a bid to create competition and lower rates for consumers.
Now, advocates are raising concerns that the General Assembly could allow Rhode Island Energy to dive back into the power generation sector, and in the process reverse a major part of energy policy that was adopted, not just in Rhode Island, but in New England as a whole in the late 1990s.
The bill is supported by the Rhode Island AFL-CIO, which, according to president Patrick Crowley, secured an agreement from Rhode Island Energy to use union labor in the construction of new power plants. It’s also backed by the Rhode Island Building and Construction Trades Council.
But it’s opposed by the Conservation Law Foundation, the Acadia Center and Green Energy Consumers Alliance, which all say the measure hasn’t been subjected to enough scrutiny.
“We believed that it was unlikely that a bill with such significant and wide-ranging impacts on the entirety of our energy generation and distribution system would pass after a single hearing without any input from energy regulatory agencies…,” the groups wrote in a joint letter to the General Assembly.
In their letter, the Conservation Law Foundation, the Acadia Center and Green Energy Consumers Alliance point out that the only written testimony filed in support of the bill during the initial committee process came from Rhode Island Energy.
Emily Koo, Rhode Island director for the Acadia Center, said her organization wasn’t convinced by the utility’s argument.
“There’s really not the evidence that reversing thirty years of power sector restructuring is going to lower costs,” she said.
To read the full article from Providence Journal, click here.