The Conservation Law Foundation is asking the Rhode Island Public Utilities Commission to reconsider its decision not to reject a consumer tax that would help pay for natural gas pipeline expansions in the region. The PUC denied CLF’s request in September.
The project was billed as a regional solution to rising electricity costs. But since then New Hampshire and Connecticut have followed Massachusetts in dropping the project. CLF Attorney Max Greene said the state of Maine has signaled it will consider the project but only if other New England states participate.
“That at this point is looking like somewhere between extremely unlikely and impossible,” said Greene. “So given circumstances as they are right now, we read that decision as a denial or a rejection of the project.”
The companies developing the Access Northeast Project want electric customers to foot the cost of expanding pipelines for natural gas in New England. This project, they say, will alleviate the rising costs of electricity during the winter.
“It’s difficult to imagine how the [RI] Public Utilities Commission could find that the project is still viable in any way when doors have been closed in all other New England states with the exception of Maine,” said Greene.
A spokesman for National Grid says the utility is still studying CLF’s request. The state Public Utilities Commission expects to make a decision on CLF’s request in December.
