Senate gives initial support to Sen. Carney bill to improve electricity affordability
AUGUSTA – Last week, the Maine Senate voted to advance LD 1949, “An Act Regarding Energy Fairness.” Sponsored by Sen. Anne Carney, D-Cape Elizabeth, the bill would direct the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) to systematically increase its focus on lowering residential energy costs by developing an electricity affordability metric; comprehensively analyzing electric delivery rates; and integrating affordability considerations across its decision-making processes, regulatory functions and responsibilities more broadly.
“Electric bills are increasingly weighing heavily on hard-working families across the state. Mainers should not have to make impossible choices between keeping the lights on and securing other basic necessities,” said Sen. Carney. “This bill offers important tools we currently lack to ease that cost burden, from systematically analyzing cost drivers to officially establishing residential affordability as a priority in law to guide decision making.”
LD 1949 directs the PUC to consider affordability impacts to Maine residents across all its duties: establishing rates, granting utility operating authority, regulating utility service standards and monitoring utility operations for safety and reliability. Residential cost burden would become a key factor for consideration in all PUC decisions around its regulation and oversight of roughly 430 electric, telephone, water and gas utility companies and districts.
Recognizing the disproportionate weight of rising electric bills on Mainers’ wallets, LD 1949 directs the PUC to develop an affordability metric to assess residential customers’ electric bill burden. The bill also directs the PUC to undertake a comprehensive review of electric delivery rates to identify opportunities to contain customer costs, reduce transmission and distribution price volatility and increase electric bill transparency.
LD 1949 offers a thoughtful next step to making Maine’s energy system fairer for residents statewide, giving urgently needed weight to electricity affordability concerns. Affordable, reliable electricity is a prerequisite for success in the state’s energy future.
LD 1949 now awaits additional votes in the House and Senate.
Sen. Carney is serving her third term in the Maine Senate, representing South Portland, Cape Elizabeth and part of Scarborough. She serves as Senate Chair of the Judiciary Committee and the Joint Rules Committee and as a member of the Inland Fisheries and Wildlife Committee.
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