Janet Mills, other New England governors oppose major utility merger
Maine Public | By Kevin Miller
Published August 18, 2026 at 5:23 PM EDT
Gov. Janet Mills joined officials from four other New England states in opposing a major acquisition in the electricity industry that the governors suggest could could impact rates and infrastructure improvements.
The proposed merger of Florida-based NextEra Energy and Dominion Energy, which is headquartered in Virginia, would reportedly create the world's largest regulated electric utility. The proposal is being reviewed by federal regulators.
But in a joint statement released on Tuesday, the governors of Maine, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont and Rhode Island said the deal would "concentrate an unprecedented amount of leverage in NextEra," with potential ramifications for ratepayers.
The governors accused NextEra of attempting to disrupt or delay electricity infrastructure improvements in New England. In particular, they pointed to NextEra spending $20 million to try to block the controversial New England Clean Energy Connect transmission line project through Maine that will funnel additional electricity from Hydro-Quebec into the regional grid.
"The states’ concern that these companies will act to disrupt and delay infrastructure development is not hypothetical," reads the joint statement released by the New England States Committee on Electricity. "NextEra has chosen to spend its considerable resources to disrupt needed infrastructure development in New England while Dominion has used its resources to lobby for out-of-market payments under the threat of retirement, which could have had dramatic impacts on the region’s resource adequacy."
The two companies already own the region's two still-operating nuclear power plants, Seabrook Station in New Hampshire and Millstone Power Station in Connecticut.
Continue reading at https://www.mainepublic.org/business-and-economy/2026-08-18/janet-m...
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Comment by Dan McKay on August 20, 2026 at 7:05am
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Janet, how do you get off criticizing private companies about how they spend their private investor's money when you have signed off on a slew of new renewable energy laws costing Maine ratepayers hundreds of million dollars?
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/
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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/
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