CLF: Utility reform will be key to confronting Maine’s high energy bills | Opinion
EXCERPTS
December 29, 2025
Phelps Turner
Phelps Turner is director of clean grid at Conservation Law Foundation.
Conservation Law Foundation, our partners and our allies have long been involved in exploring modern, more affordable ways to bolster our electricity grid, balancing the need to invest with the strain we’re all feeling on our wallets...........................
Additionally, we don’t always need new poles and miles of wires to improve our electricity grid. Traditional grid infrastructure, like poles and wires, is costly to install, maintain and repair after extreme storms. Smarter, cheaper solutions exist.
Utilities can make use of energy storage, energy efficiency, distributed generation and demand response programs to strengthen the grid, reduce costs, slash emissions and make it more resilient to storms and climate impacts. Energy that is generated or stored in locations at or near the point of electricity consumption — rather than at a central power plant — reduces the need for an expensive grid that delivers power over long distances.
New rate structures or incentives, including time-of-use rates and heat pump rates, help shift electricity demand from periods of higher consumption, like late afternoon/early evening, to periods of lower use, like early mornings.
https://www.pressherald.com/2025/12/29/utility-reform-will-be-key-t...
*************************************
Fair Use Notice: This website may reproduce or have links to copyrighted material the use of which has not been expressly authorized by the copyright owner. We make such material available, without profit, as part of our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, economic, scientific, and related issues. It is our understanding that this constitutes a "fair use" of any such copyrighted material as provided by law. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes that go beyond "fair use," you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
Views: 10
Comment
-
Comment by Long Islander 4 hours ago
-
Who will pay for the billions of dollars required to implement these proven tools and policies? Why have we spent the last 20 years adding capacity (renewables) while losing production? Why are we allowing the construction of energy facilities with a direct cost to Maine ratepayers to serve other states/regions?
-
Comment by Dan McKay 7 hours ago
-
I've read enough of Willem Post's take on distributed energy aka solar, wind and batteries to know what a charade this racket Phelps Turner is pushing would cost us, if it were even possible to implement it. The guy is a dope.
Maine as Third World Country:
CMP Transmission Rate Skyrockets 19.6% Due to Wind Power
Click here to read how the Maine ratepayer has been sold down the river by the Angus King cabal.
Maine Center For Public Interest Reporting – Three Part Series: A CRITICAL LOOK AT MAINE’S WIND ACT
******** IF LINKS BELOW DON'T WORK, GOOGLE THEM*********
(excerpts) From Part 1 – On Maine’s Wind Law “Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine if the law’s goals were met." . – Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting, August 2010 https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/From Part 2 – On Wind and Oil Yet using wind energy doesn’t lower dependence on imported foreign oil. That’s because the majority of imported oil in Maine is used for heating and transportation. And switching our dependence from foreign oil to Maine-produced electricity isn’t likely to happen very soon, says Bartlett. “Right now, people can’t switch to electric cars and heating – if they did, we’d be in trouble.” So was one of the fundamental premises of the task force false, or at least misleading?" https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/wind-swept-task-force-set-the-rules/From Part 3 – On Wind-Required New Transmission Lines Finally, the building of enormous, high-voltage transmission lines that the regional electricity system operator says are required to move substantial amounts of wind power to markets south of Maine was never even discussed by the task force – an omission that Mills said will come to haunt the state.“If you try to put 2,500 or 3,000 megawatts in northern or eastern Maine – oh, my god, try to build the transmission!” said Mills. “It’s not just the towers, it’s the lines – that’s when I begin to think that the goal is a little farfetched.” https://www.pinetreewatchdog.org/flaws-in-bill-like-skating-with-dull-skates/
Not yet a member?
Sign up today and lend your voice and presence to the steadily rising tide that will soon sweep the scourge of useless and wretched turbines from our beloved Maine countryside. For many of us, our little pieces of paradise have been hard won. Did the carpetbaggers think they could simply steal them from us?
We have the facts on our side. We have the truth on our side. All we need now is YOU.
“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”
-- Mahatma Gandhi
"It's not whether you get knocked down: it's whether you get up."
Vince Lombardi
Task Force membership is free. Please sign up today!
Hannah Pingree on the Maine expedited wind law
Hannah Pingree - Director of Maine's Office of Innovation and the Future
"Once the committee passed the wind energy bill on to the full House and Senate, lawmakers there didn’t even debate it. They passed it unanimously and with no discussion. House Majority Leader Hannah Pingree, a Democrat from North Haven, says legislators probably didn’t know how many turbines would be constructed in Maine."
https://pinetreewatch.org/wind-power-bandwagon-hits-bumps-in-the-road-3/
© 2025 Created by Webmaster.
Powered by
You need to be a member of Citizens' Task Force on Wind Power - Maine to add comments!
Join Citizens' Task Force on Wind Power - Maine