Does your heart pound with dread every time the electric bill lands in your mailbox? If so, you’re not alone.
With electricity rates in Maine rising more than 50 percent over the past decade — more than twice the national average — policymakers are missing the boat when it comes it why ratepayers keep getting stuck with higher bills, energy experts and concerned legislators say. While the state is increasingly vulnerable to storm damage to its distribution network, too little is being done to amp up generation capacity.
Less than a third of the electricity Mainers use is generated in state. To make matters worse, initiatives to grow realistic self-sufficiency when it comes to electricity keep getting blocked.
Since 2019, Maine has been a net importer of electricity. According to the Energy Information Administration, it generates less power than all but five other states across America. As of 2023, Maine was importing between 10 to 30 percent of the electricity it consumes from other states, or Canada.
The move away from petroleum or other fossil-fuel generated power over the past several decades accounts for much of the current deficit, analysts agree. The question that comes is how best to reliably fill the gap.
While more than two-thirds of current power generation comes from renewable sources, including hydro, wind-power and and biomass, the most reliable source for electricity is natural gas-fired plants. Yet the efforts of former Maine Governor Paul LePage to build more gas pipelines kept getting nixed by his political opponents in the legislature.
An overly sunny view on the prospects for solar power, which the state heavily subsidizes in a way that critics say places an uneven burden on the shoulders of ratepayers, is part of the problem, many think. So too was a quixotic hope tethered to wind power, which hasn’t panned out either, and now federal subsidies for that are on the chopping block.
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“I believe a comprehensive “cradle to grave” evaluation of each wind and solar has not been diligently engaged, and proponents have neglected to focus on critical aspects such as return on investment rates and end of life cycle disposal costs,” state Rep. Mathew McIntyre (R-Lowell), who serves on the legislature’s Energy, Utilities and Technology Committee recently wrote in an op-ed for the Lincoln News.
“In all scenarios, I believe investments at a state level should be based on requests for proposals from industry under competitive bid processes rather than continued ratepayer subsidies to unscrupulous profiteers,” Rep. McIntyre added.
“We’ve got to be careful about putting all our eggs in one basket,” McIntyre told The Maine Wire, referring to Maine Democrats’ insistence on pursuing only green energy solutions and making the state powered entirely by climate-friendly energy by the now-elapsed deadline of 2024.
An ideological adherence to a “green energy revolution” that is spelled out in Governor Janet Mills’ 2020 “Maine Can’t Wait” policy framework for achieving that goal often impedes what former public advocate Bill Harwood called a “thoughtful and careful approach.”
As European countries of Spain and Portugal grapple with power black-outs this week, one can only imagine that the green-dominant energy policies play some role in the chaos and disruption that ensued there.
Another Republican who serves on the energy committee agrees a certain willful blindness towards realistic sources of power generation is driving the soaring costs of electricity that afflict ratepayers already experiencing an array of economic pressures.
“Maine’s energy prices are soaring because majority Democrats are putting climate ideology ahead of what’s best for ratepayers—pushing unreliable wind and solar that need massive subsidies and still can’t deliver consistent power,” Rep. Reagan Paul (R-Winterport) told The Maine Wire.
“They’re rejecting proven sources like nuclear, restricting natural gas, and even capping clean hydro—all while forcing costly mandates that leave Mainers paying more for less reliable energy,” she added.
While the solution appears to be rooted in common-sense, the political climate in Augusta at the moment appears committed to channeling any discussion about reforming the broken energy sector to something colored green.
A report late last year found that 100,000 Mainers are struggling to pay their ever-rising electrical bills. Meanwhile, a major potato grower in Aroostook County testified at a legislative hearing on the controversial Net Energy Billing program that he is paying $57,000 a month in electrical bills.
At some point soon, it is becoming increasingly clear, policy-makers in Augusta will need to take off their green-tinted glasses and focus on solutions to the rising costs of electricity that are rooted less in wishful thinking and based more on common sense.
