A ruling this week by the Massachusetts Supreme Court has implications for the future of natural gas in Connecticut and other New England states.
This week the Bay State’s highest court overturned a 2015 decision by its utilities regulatory – the equivalent of Connecticut’s Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA) – that gave Eversource and National Grid the green light to recover from electric ratepayers the costs of added gas pipeline capacity.
The court wrote in its decision that such cost recovery “would undermine the main objectives” of the utility restructuring of the late 1990s and “reexpose ratepayers to the types of risks from which the legislature sought to protect them.”
Both Eversource and National Grid are involved in the proposed $3 billion expansion of Spectra Energy’s Algonquin pipeline — a project known as Access Northeast.
Eversource said in June that Access Northeast intended to submit a bid in response to Connecticut’s request for proposals issued by the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) for expanded natural gas capacity. DEEP has not yet announced results of the RFP.
An Eversource financial analyst told the Hartford Business Journal recently that both Massachusetts and Connecticut contracts are seen as a linchpin for Access Northeast.
Advocates of bringing more gas to the region say it will reduce New England’s high electricity prices. Eversource said the project would save New England ratepayers a total of $1 billion per year.
The Massachusetts ruling came just one week after lawmakers there authorized bringing in more hydropower from Canada.
The Massachusetts Senate had proposed banning tariffs on electric ratepayers to fund pipeline expansion, but the ban didn’t make it into the final bill, the Boston Globe reported.
Eversource said in a statement Wednesday that the court’s decision “leaves the region in a precarious position without sufficient gas capacity for electric generation during cold winters – which drives electricity prices up for our customers.”
“The project would also displace oil and coal-fired generation with cleaner-burning natural gas – reducing regional emissions and improving the environment,” Eversource said. “While the Court’s decision is certainly a setback, we will re-evaluate our path forward and remain committed to working with the New England states to provide the infrastructure so urgently needed to ensure reliable and lower-cost electricity for customers.”
