A proposal to prohibit natural gas companies from installing new natural gas infrastructure for Maine homes has resurfaced in the second regular session for the legislature, a session typically reserved for emergency bills.
The bill, LD 2077, was proposed by one of the Energy, Utilities, and Technology Committee’s chairs, Rep. Stanley Zeigler (D-Montville).
The proposal would prevent natural gas companies from expanding infrastructure into new areas and force new customers in areas that already have infrastructure to pay the full cost of their home’s natural gas hookup.
Beginning January 1, 2025, the Maine Public Utilities Commission would not be allowed to approve any gas utility to serve a customer in any municipality that is outside of the gas utility’s service area on June 30, 2024.
The Committee on Energy, Utilities, and Technology (EUT) held a public hearing on Tuesday to discuss the proposal, which supporters believe will reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and thereby lower global temperatures.
Not everyone agreed that it was the proper role of government to intervene in Maine’s energy markets in such a manner.
“I believe that this proposed legislation is not only a clear case of government overreach, but also causes further harm to hardworking Maine taxpayers, with an increased cost for existing gas customers,” said Rep. Joseph Underwood (R-Presque Isle) who spoke against the bill.
If the bill passes, companies would be prohibited from offering new customers any promotional deals to reduce the cost of a gas hookup and would be banned from subsidizing the cost of new customers by changing the gas rates of existing customers.
Supporters included Public Advocate Bill Harwood, Jack Shapiro of the Natural Resources Council of Maine (NRCM), and many other members of environmental groups.
Harwood opposed natural gas, in part, because he believes that the natural gas customers are essentially captive, and will be forced to pay whatever rate the company chooses.
Rep. Larry Dunphy (R-Embden) opposed that objection, on the grounds that “renewable” energy sources have the same, if not worse, problems with captive customers.
“Talk about captive customers with gas, looks like we’ve done the same thing with wind, solar, and offshore wind, where the hell else are they going to get their energy from?” asked Rep. Dunphy.
Proponents of the bill also opposed natural gas on the grounds that some data suggests that significant amounts of methane have been leaked from natural gas pipelines.
After four people spoke in favor of the bill, Rep. Zeigler, concerned with the hearing running too long, decided to move forward with those speaking against his bill, before returning to hear more speakers in favor.
“Unless we want to be here until the methane emitting cows come home, we want to limit our amount of questions,” said Zeigler.
Kurt Adams, the CEO of Summit Systems, spoke against the bill, and denied claims that natural gas leaks were happening in Maine.
He pointed out that Summit Systems does its own audits of its natural gas lines, and has found no evidence of leakage, and suggested the bill’s proponents were using national data to support their claims rather than Maine specific data.
“This bill represents a national conversation that people are trying to import to Maine” said Adams.
Other people who spoke against the bill include everyday Mainers, such as Mark Chassie, who previously worked in the medical field, and Jenny Flood, a self-described “dairy farmer and mum.”
Flood’s farm was connected to the natural gas system and now produces negative-carbon natural gas by using the methane emissions from cow manure to produce energy.
Even the liberal Senate President Troy Jackson (D-Aroostook) came to testify against the bill.
Although he was careful to voice his support for the state’s move to renewable energy, he was opposed to the bill, which he believed would harm Mainers trying to heat their homes.
He was particularly opposed to its effect on Northern Maine, which has not yet had any natural gas infrastructure installed, since the bill would prevent the services being brought there.
Sen. Jackson went so far as to call the bill “anti-Northern.”
Scratch a liberal, expose a tyrant
Once again, Maine legislators think they know what’s best for Maine. The government overreach is all over this bill. I agree with Senator Dunphy – we are trapped into wind, solar and offshore wind energy producing venues that are all subsidized by Mainers. I just got my electric bill – over $400! This bill will do nothing to help Mainers, only hurt them. If you really want to make an impact on the environment, stop buying items made in China and India. Check out how the wind currents flow around the world. The two countries alone are causing more problems for our environment than natural gas ever would.
The current Federal and State leaders do not care for the American people and no longer represent us.
As the character Dr Evil in the Mike Myers Austin Powers series said; why must I be surrounded by frikkin idiots?
They just did the same thing in Washington State, obviously this is an end run on what the Biden administration tried.at the federal level. This is just death by a thousand paper cuts. These democrats are just power hungry as well as evil.
What do we do when the very premise of the bill is false? Future generations will be astounded at our idiocy.
Why do liberals insist on such backwards anti progressive thinking? How will the state attract businesses and good paying without something as basic as reliable utilities. There is no cost effective replacement for natural gas in industrial processes, power generation or building heat. Hopefully the Legislature has the brains and common sense to kill this proposal.
Natural gas is a clean and abundant energy source. Expansion should be encouraged….. no intermittent power source issues, no mountaintop blasting and no ugly solar farms. Next on the list is a ban on cows!!!
Ziegler is so clueless. Someone should shut his fossil fuels off. I guarantee he has them in some capacity.
I doubt this bill as other agenda driven bills will pass this session. It is after all an election year. What you can count on is that this as well as LD 1735 and other radical and harmful bills will resurface next year if voters continue to vote Democrats into the majority. We will have a minor reprieve from the extremism this year but wait till next year if voters don’t vote or vote for unprincipled Democrats. Voting has Consequences. We are literally at war with an ideology that is never satisfied always craving more and more.
I thought the short session was for carry overs and emergency bills only?
The push for the elimination of oil, gases, and coal energies at its core is not about replacing them with cleaner energy sources, but to have control over society.
Look at electric vehicles as an example: electric drive systems are great, however the battery/storage of power is the premier issue that hobbles this type of vehicle. Locomotives, modern cruise ships, and most newer tug boats all use electrical propulsion systems, however they all all diesel generators that power these drive systems. So the electric drive is not the issue, it is the storage component of this system that comes up short. There are very simple modifications to the current automotive fuel design systems that can achieve the same environmental goals that the electric drive automobile is attempting to accomplish without changing anything else in vehicles as we know them today, and this technology exist today. So why ignore this option when everything about it is cleaner?
Hydrogen is a viable replacement fuel for the automobile industry requiring only design change to the fuel storage, and intake components of the gasoline engines of today without ANY other modifications.
Hydrogen requires very little energy to create: electrolizers can separate the hydrogen molecule using only a couple of amps of power. All of the solar arrays that are popping up everywhere could be downsized substantially and used for this process for community size need.
Hydrogen fuel cells convert hydrogen fuel into electricity, and can be used for household utilities as well as automotive applications. Fuel cells can be sized for personal, city block, or larger industrial need. These type of systems could eliminate the central power grid. Xerox in California converted their building, and vehicle fleet to this type of system.
Both the internal combustion engine, and the hydrogen fuel cell produce water vapor as a byproduct when using hydrogen as a fuel source.
This technology exist today, and could be rolled out for mass consumption within a decade eliminating all the mining/processing for electric vehicle battery raw elements, the proposed electrical corridor through Maine that has gotten so much resistance would no longer be needed, power outages from storms would nearly cease to exist, all the raw materials for power transmission lines would no longer be needed just to cite a few examples of what utilizing this type of power generation fuel/would accomplish.
So why do we not embark on this journey rather than the current journey? The answer is simple: it removes centralized control over the population.
Jeremy Rifkin’s book titled The Hydrogen Economy is well worth the read for those interested in knowing more of these systems, and several years back I read an article about a private/public hydrogen project that included VA. Tech that I am sure can still be found by all you internet sleuths. This project consisted of solar as the primary power for a household with the storage system rather than batteries being hydrogen. Any power not utilized for household needs was directed to hydrogen electrolizers; the released hydrogen molecule was then sent through a drier, then compressed, and stored in underground tanks that are used for propane. At night when the solar panels stopped producing electricity a fuel cell was used to generate household power needs. If I remember correctly about thirteen percent of total power generated went into the hydrogen conversion process.
The push to eliminate meat consumption is also a fake narrative as many large farms now employ fermenters that take the animal waste such as in the Mad Max series Beyond The Thunder Dome converting this waste throughout inorganic fermentation to create methane gas which in turn is then used for power generation. Not to be punny, but this green push is bullshit.
So the push for net zero carbon has nothing to do with a cleaner environment as the technology to accomplish this is already available, but not implemented as it reduces the control that a central grid system imposes over its citizenry.
Were did these folks come from!
Appears to me Rep. Stanley Zeigler (D-Montville but hails from York, Pennsyvania) has loads of time on his hands and can’t think of anything worth proposing, so he befriends Greta Thunberg on facebook and a little later, from deep in his hovel in Montville, hatches this piece of sh*t legislation.
Stanley go back home!