Why Mass. Lags On Gov Deval Patrick’s Wind Power Goal
Three things to think about when looking at Massachusetts and wind power:
1. It is policies in southern New England that are causing wind projects to be built in Maine. These policies mandate that wind electricity be purchased. The average citizen in southern New England has very little awareness how wind power is adversely impacting their electricity bills or northern New Englanders. It is not the average citizen in southern New England that is "demanding" wind power, but rather their state legislatures. The state legislatures vote in these mandates largely due to influence from the wind lobby, political correctness, directives from their party leadership, kleptocracy and media which do not properly inform their audiences.
The citizens of Maine need to directly communicate to the citizens of Mass and Ct. just how much harm their states' mandates are causing Mainers.
2. When the actual citizens of Mass were asked to pay extra for wind power, they refused to.
"Some programs have not been as popular as expected, May added. NStar Green, the program under which consumers can pay a premium to ensure some of their electricity is generated by wind, has attracted only 8,000 NStar customers - less than 1 percent of the company’s 1.1 million electricity consumers, he said. “We were a little disappointed that it was not greater,’’ May said. “Being the greenest state in the land of the free, we have a more educated audience, we have a more concerned, socially conscious audience. So we thought we would do better.’’ --- NStar CEO Thomas May
http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/green/articles/2010/01/20/nstar_chi...
3. First Wind CEO Paul Gaynor is Mass Gov. Deval Patrick's "green policy advisor".
http://dailybail.com/home/deval-patrick-paul-gaynor-crony-capitalis...
Why Mass. Lags On Patrick’s Wind Power Goal
EXCERPTS:
But Paul Copleman — a spokesman for Iberdrola Renewables, which owns Hoosac — says the Spanish company has no plans to build more wind farms in Massachusetts, even though under state law utilities are required to buy an increasing share of their electricity from clean, renewable sources like wind.
......“The idea looked perfect,” said Brian Allen, general manager of Princeton’s Municipal Light Department. “We had a perfect location. We had plenty of wind. This should be a no-brainer.”
Instead, it was a major headache. First, the price of electricity generated from natural gas plummeted, so Princeton couldn’t find buyers for its more expensive wind energy. Then one of the turbine gearboxes suffered a catastrophic $800,000 failure. The town sued, but the company that built them went bankrupt.
Today Princeton has the second-highest electricity rates in the state.
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Comment
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Comment by Kathy Sherman on March 25, 2014 at 1:51pm
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I know that cap-and-trade is a big part of it, and the Massachusetts RPS mandates have been put as "cap and trade" by proponents of renewable - as a model for California of all things (full circle - bring those rolling blackouts on!). However, at least for the ISO-NE sector, I don"t think there is even that much dirty coal left, although oil might come back for when natural gas is constrained. Our use of petroleum is for transport!! We will just drive more electricity guzzlers like NSA, banking data centers, etc either out of the country entirely or to big coal-consuming states like Texas. I will try to share your faith that things are changing, but the news on the transmission plans has me pretty bummed even though I had been seeing it coming. Maybe the only good news from the last month or so is that the parent of Iberdola didn't consent to one of the projects in the MA utility long-term contracts.
But then I see thesolutionsproject.org - only checked Maine, but it was 35% land-based and 35% offshore wind for 100% renewable by 2050. I swear the aim of this is to get all the people out of the boonies where they were enjoying their life and wildlife into the city.
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Comment by Martha thacker on March 25, 2014 at 12:12pm
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The buying and selling of renewable energy credits is what cap and trade is all about. Not helping the environment, but Wall Street.Maybe there are technicalities over terms used ..i.e. the way the bankers have ripped off the American people by technicalities. Everything is legal for the corporations until fairly recently when Duke Energy lost over the bird problem. This was the signal that things are changing and more shall I say honest.
The reason that upper state ME and NY have been targeted for wind farms is that PPAs with foreign countries do not require energy to be produced. Canada....
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It's not true that Mass doesn't have the renewable resource- solar photovoltaic build up very quickly and can be placed near the population centers, rather than the more sparsely populated conserved parts of the state. Maine isn't a Saudi at number 25 for wind, and Mass is further down at 35th, but has already sacrificed 24 sq. mi. plus of Nantucket Sound and federal leases were already granted for massive wind offshore, even though the wind speeds there are likely not competitive with the very tip of Maine or the North Sea.
The RECs don't have to be 'cap and trade'. It has been pointed out that coal-generators already had to meet tough Clean Air standards enacted in Mass 20 years ago, and cheap gas had driven some out. New England's nuclear generators are really precarious. But we are not going to replace base load with wind and solar and hydro - look at Ontario.
What I question is these executive branch decrees, and legislation written by the exec. The Governor's conferences have continually come up with bad deals for everyone.
NStar had been buying its wind energy for RPS compliance and 'green rates' from troubled wind farms in NY. The 'green rates' aren't even that much more and the difference was tax-deductible. But anybody can buy RECs, so my fear is that investors (speculators) will manipulate the markets, leaving consumers even more at the mercy of volatile rates.
It certainly is not as simple as making some LOCAL energy, the story sold to us.
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Massachusetts could be the Saudi Arabia of Wind...leave ME alone!!!
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Comment by Dan McKay on March 24, 2014 at 10:55am
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http://www.governorswindenergycoalition.org/?p=8228
Selling undelivered and unreliable wind power.
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How can the RECs etc. even be legal when cap and trade did not pass muster through the legislative process in DC?
Since power is lost for every mile in transmission, ,how could ME wind farms even help supply the enormous population in Mass. anyway?
I think the money was in RECs to start with and the power lines aren't even needed. And in more current SEC reports under risk factors, First Wind says lack of transmission access is a good thing. Some policos are being caught with their pants down. Poor MPUC is having to take the brunt of the accusations /condemnations. They weren't even asked to come to the hearing between US govt. and FERC over the building of Stetson I ...because there was no room on the grid for any new generators.
Our current wannabe candidates for gov. seem to be jumping on the band wagon after it is stalled and in a questionable neighborhood at that. Sad to be so locked in. Politics is changing and some people don't even know it. Gov. Cuomo could very likely be facing opposition in NY from a progressive base that sees him as letting them down.
Rep. Mike Michaud, think long and hard about who you jump in the band wagon with.
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What these people in Mass. don’t realize is that with no renewable generation in state to satisfy their RPS, they must buy renewable energy credits to meet the standards. These RECs basically double the supply costs of electricity, therefore, the very people who shunned the “ green “ offer from their utilities are having it shoved right down their throats. While, in Maine, where intermittent generation takes place, the costs of transmission and reliability go up and the PUC sets up long term contracts with renewable generators that adds additional costs to in State customers.
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Comment by Gary Campbell on March 24, 2014 at 9:58am
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This is our chance to comment on how the people of Massachusetts see Maine as their personal energy plantation. So long as Maine allows First Wind to destroy its mountains, lakes and tourism economy, they're happy buying the electricity so they can feel they've done their part to save the planet.
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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