How an Independent Judiciary is Keeping the Lights On and Power Prices Low in the Northeast US

Federal judges may be rescuing the Trump Administration from a corner it was rapidly painting itself into: the appearance that it had virtually declared a war on energy in the six states of New England, denying them the only available solution to an escalating energy crisis.

 

The core problem: for geologic and geographic reasons, New England cannot access sufficient natural gas or oil to meet its growing fundamental energy needs – particularly as power hungry data centers come online to support demand from AI.

 

The region’s hydro power was fully developed decades ago. It’s also at the end of America’s gas pipelines and power grid, so the region cannot import enough to meet its growing population and energy needs.

 

New England consistently faces high power costs – which are forecast to get even more expensive in the months and years ahead.

 

The problem is getting worse: Maine, for example, is about to double everyone’s power bills. But for the last five years, the rapidly falling cost and rising availability of off-shore wind promises a solution to these higher prices. With a lot of high velocity wind, it is the one energy source the Northeast enjoyed in abundance.

 

The new Administration, however, is trying to force all states to restore their dependence on oil, coal and gas – to the detriment of the air we breathe and our warming climate.

 

In less than a year President Trump’s promised “energy dominance” has triggered an energy war among the states.

 

If your state enjoys a major fossil fuel surplus, including Texas, North Dakota, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, Louisiana and West Virginia, there are benefits to sharing in Trump’s strategy.

 

However, that leaves 44 states paying more for the privilege of relying on their neighbors to provide the energy they need instead of generating it themselves through wind and solar.

 

New England in particular is one region that has a hard time accessing the fossil fuels it needs because its at the end of the delivery system’s pipelines.

 

Prior to the Administration’s anti-renewable energy efforts, off-shore wind was on verge of delivering energy abundance to New England. By this spring five major new northeast wind projects were under construction capable of delivering power to millions of homes across the region. Just one of the projects, Revolution off the Connecticut coast, is only a few months from delivering enough juice to relieve grid demand from 840,000 residents across New England.

 

Then the Administration declared war on renewable energy that was set to deliver needed cost relief to an entire region. At his inauguration earlier this year, the President proclaimed a power crisis that was non-existent at the time. Over the next few months his cabinet actually created an energy crisis by cancelling huge segments of the power generation market – including major wind projects in the Northeast.

 

One of the first focuses of the new Administration was to eliminate New England’s main power solutions.

 

Interior secretary Doug Burgum put into plain words what was meant: “Under this administration, there is not a future for offshore wind”. Within six months the President used his executive powers to withdraw or cancel the leases for off-shore wind almost anywhere in the United States, but particularly in the New England where six offshore wind project’s permits were — after the fact—cancelled or threatened.

 

The President even ordered a shut-down of the Revolution Wind farm, off the coast of Connecticut, which was getting ready to generate enough electricity to power 840,000 northeasterners starting next year.

 

This threat to all New England’s new wind projects, combined with the shortage of available gas pipeline and transmission capacity, meant that New England would suffer power outages, probably on a frequent and massive basis, during the region’s next brutal winter. ISO New England, the non-profit that manages the grid in the six New England states, released a statement last month that expressed concern over the stop work order issued to Revolution Wind, saying, “The ISO is expecting this project to come online and it is included in our analyses of near-term and future grid reliability.”

 

The President of the United States appeared, instead, to embrace the idea that 15 million Americans, in six states, should face winter devastated by avoidable power failures, price spikes and blackout.

 

Trump claims he is opposed to off-shore wind because it is too expensive. Independent studies by Lazard and others show this is not the case. Off shore wind typically costs $108 for a Megawatt hour of electricity. A new Combustion Cycle gas plant costs averages $198. New nuclear power averages $207 per Megawatt hour — almost twice the cost of off-shore wind. Indeed, off-shore wind costs dramatically less than most of the President’s favorite electric power sources.

 

As catastrophe has loomed, the rule law has thankfully intervened.

 

A federal judge ruled that the developers trying to finish Revolution, the Danish firm Orsted, was likely to win its lawsuit documenting that the Administration’s logic for cancelling their off-shore permits were “arbitrary and capricious”. The judge ruled that the project should be completed, which would significantly relieve the looming power shortages facing New England.

 

Other renewable power cancellations have been successfully defended in court. One unintended consequence of the Trump administration’s actions against wind in New England is that the region’s main alternative is to import electricity from Canada.

 

Fifty years ago, President Gerald Ford got in trouble for his attitude towards a financially stressed New York City, with the iconic New York Daily News cover that said: “Ford to City: Drop Dread.”

 

Just imagine how America would respond in the future when – not if — a ferocious winter locks the Northeast in the grip of a Polar Vortex, with thousands of Yankees freezing without reliable power.

 

At the moment, that looks less likely thanks to an independent judiciary that has seen through the Trump administration’s efforts against renewables and protected the one of the best ways to keep the power running and keep prices down.