Maryland legislative leaders on Monday announced measures aimed at curbing the rapid rise in electricity bills while still moving the state toward more renewable energy generation.
The package includes three bills, which are slated to be formally introduced Monday evening. They emphasize building up the electricity generated in the state to reduce the amount of energy that needs to be purchased elsewhere.
The first bill requires the Public Service Commission to solicit bids for and approve new electricity generation facilities that can support the large amount of electricity used in the hottest part of the summer.
“We remain committed to maintaining our ambitious climate goals while keeping the lights on,” Senate President Bill Ferguson said during a press conference Monday. “This means that any new natural gas, even remotely considered, must be designed to be convertible to hydrogen or other zero emission fuels as soon as the technology commercially allows.”
He said the legislation prioritizes projects that rely on renewable energy sources, such as solar or wind, and that integrate battery storage. It sets “aggressive timelines” for the facilities to be up and running by streamlining approval processes.
The second bill in the package focuses on solar-powered electricity. It creates consumer protections designed to make it easier, safer and more affordable for residents to install their own solar panels. And it permits local governments to enroll residents in community solar programs, which allows people who can’t install their own solar panels to purchase their electricity from communal solar farms.
The bill also creates statewide standards for building and permitting solar and battery storage projects in an effort to remove some of the local zoning hurdles those projects currently face.
“We must provide regulatory certainty and predictability if we want solar and battery storage projects benefiting Marylanders to get built here,” said Sen. Brian Feldman, the chair of the Education, Energy and the Environment Committee and the bill’s Senate sponsor. “Removing the uncertainty surrounding local siting will make these projects cheaper, quicker to construct, and is the shortest term option towards bringing much needed electric capacity online in this state.”
The last bill in the package creates an independent office within the Maryland Public Service Commission that will engage in long-term planning for the state’s electricity needs. Del. Brian Crosby, the House sponsor of that bill, said the state previously had a similar office before the state’s utilities were deregulated in 1999.
“What this package is about is about more Maryland-made energy, about that energy is cleaner than the energy that we produce today, and that we get it now,” Ferguson said. “What we know to be the case is that our dirty oil and coal plants are still in existence, and they're going offline eventually, but in the meantime, we're paying even more to keep them running.”
Republican leaders said the Democrats’ plan won’t yield results quickly enough because of its reliance on renewable energy.
“Let's hear something that would have some immediate results,” said Senate Minority Leader Steve Hershey. “This is a lot of pie in the sky.”
He suggested Maryland should be boosting natural gas generation to address an immediate electricity shortage. He criticized the state’s ban on hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” which was championed by former Gov. Larry Hogan.
“In Western Maryland, you know, they've put enough policies in place to hurt energy production, and now they're claiming that they can come back with solar and batteries and reclaim that, and that's just not — the technology is not there, and it's just not possible,” Hershey said.
