Regulators in Vermont have issued a waiver to permit biomass plants Ryegate Power and the McNeil Generating Station in Burlington to purchase low-grade wood that had been destined for a Glens Falls mill, Finch Paper, before it suddenly discontinued its pulpwood operation in July.
This era of easy access gave the gas towns a leg up that many other regions would never receive, laying the groundwork for a lingering disparity that remains today.
Twenty-five years of New England electricity data reveal persistent fossil dependence and growing cost and reliability risks as demand begins to rise
Without certified inverters, fully built solar farms will sit dark and unable to feed electricity to the grid.
A reader wrote in with a sharp, three-part question about Efficiency Vermont: Has the utility ever stated how much less electricity the state uses because of its work? Would that number hold up if you normalized for businesses that have left Vermont? And doesn’t cutting electricity use actually push rates up, since the grid’s fixed costs don’t go away when sales fall?
The published agenda reads: Proposed Site Development; Battery Storage, Data Center and mini nuclear power plant.
We bring the data. You form the opinions.
The 4.99 MW Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) will deliver backup power for four hours at peak output, according to a December, 2025 report to the Vermont Public Utilities Commission (PUC), the state’s regulatory and permitting body for most energy projects. The project, built by Lightshift Energy on private land, would expand battery storage capacity already present in nearby Panton.
Former Vermont governor Howard Dean is warning that proposals to expand nuclear power and attract large-scale data centers risk creating long-term environmental and economic problems for the state.
Spearheaded by the Vermont Public Service Department, the program would give energy navigator services to Vermont residents. Energy navigators are trained professionals or volunteers who inform residents how to make their homes more energy efficient, such as with weatherization projects or installing heat pumps. Under the bill, they would also inform clients about rebates and incentives.
“Foundational” first step toward Cap & Invest Carbon Tax passes on a near party line vote after Republican fight.
Vermont produces six times less energy than it consumes and depends on trucked-in petroleum for both transportation and home heating.
Vermonters are “stuck using fossil fuels, the polluting fuels of the past,” committee chair says.
How much of my $150 month electric bill is going toward fighting global warming?
Efficiency Vermont, the wholly owned division of the 40-year-old Winooski, Vermont nonprofit, Vermont Energy Investment Corporation, has done a remarkable job over the past 25 years. Let us accept this and repurpose its funding from Vermont’s electric rate-payers.
Green River Hydro gets 40-Year lifeline
Direct hydro for Vermont data farms: reliable, renewable, local
Well, Rep. Laura Sibilia (I-Dover), the Ranking Member on James’ committee and perhaps the biggest booster of the Clean Heat Standard, spilled the beans, let the cat out of the bag, dropped the dime on the real agenda in an interview for Climate Dispatch.
Gas was prioritized for home heating, forcing power plants to burn expensive oil instead and to import Liquified Natural Gas from foreign countries in container ships at 3-5 times the normal, unconstrained cost of Marcellus Shale gas. Wholesale electricity prices (called LMPs) spiked dramatically, with peaks over $660/MWh on January 27 and averages far higher than normal during the event. For comparison, the most recently reported average annual wholesale cost of ISO-NE electricity was $40/MWh for 2024.
The Public Utility Commission ultimately concluded the CHS is theoretically workable but not well suited to Vermont.
“The value of a great corn crop on a good year would net a farmer $400 an acre. I’ve heard values on solar rent paid to the farmer up to $2,000 per acre,” Nelson said.
Québec takes care of its own people first
A pair of bills sponsored by the chairs of energy committees in both House and Senate would further regulate and tax the sale of fossil fuels in Vermont.
Bills, news rules impact cost of fuel, fuel storage, overtime pay, credit card usage
Vermonters use less total energy than the residents of any other state in the nation and their total energy consumption per capita is among the lowest five states. About 11% of Vermonters heat with wood, the highest share of any state, according to the EIA.
All permanent ground solar should require local town permitting complete with Notice and Public Comment, with certified letters including Notice and Public Comment opportunity to abutters.
But a new study shows it doesn’t have to be this way!
The Global Warming Solutions Act money pit deepens!
Never think your vote doesn’t matter…the original tally was 87-86, but one ballot – a Yes – was spoiled because it was signed by the voter.
What the Attorney General does not explain is why federal officials might be less than enthusiastic about writing those checks. A few possibilities come to mind.
Sponsored by Better Not Bigger Vermont.
Short answer: Nope.
Richard Heinberg, a senior fellow at the Post Carbon Institute and a prominent voice on global energy trends, will give a public presentation on December 16 examining what he describes as mounting pressures on both the world’s—and Vermont’s—energy systems.
Some other Vermont environmentalists have questioned the seemingly obvious inconsistency between “blocking out the sun will save the earth” and “solar energy will save the earth…”
The U.S. power supply shortage is largely the fault of Bernie and other Green New Dealers who have intentionally pushed increased electricity consumption – heat pumps and electric cars, anyone? – while shutting down power producers that actually keep the grid afloat.
The debate in Pittsford wasn’t about personalities or local politics. It reflected a broader question confronting nearly every town in Vermont: Where does state law end and agency preference begin?
Vermont has 14 municipal electric departments, most with fewer than 3,000 customers. Several have recently filed significant rate increases or faced operational challenges.
The program matches the pricing of GMP’s existing Tesla Powerwall lease program, which charges the same $55 monthly rate, but installation can be costly.
A Texas developer’s proposal for a large battery storage system at the former Vermont Yankee nuclear site highlights a sizable list important considerations.
Predatory industrial-scale renewable energy development in Vermont has just reached an all-time low with continued ecological devastation and accompanying rate hikes in queue.
It had a federal grant. It had a buyer for renewable energy credits. But the proposed Lyndon biomass plant didn’t have a path forward to get a guaranteed high price for the energy it would make.
Why the elected town government, acting on behalf of all its constituents, would trade its opposition for nearly a quarter-million dollars in annual revenue and other benefits.
Seven Days ran an article recently about Vermont’s solar industry and the impact of federal cuts to the subsidies they’ve enjoyed for years. The headline authors called the cuts an “attack.” No, it’s not an attack. No private business is entitled to taxpayer funds to keep it afloat.
The Commission’s letter observed repeated issues across various cases, impacting both BED’s role as an energy efficiency utility and a distribution utility.
In 1925, Vermont had over 3.3 million acres of agricultural land. Fast forward to 2022 and this number has dwindled to 543,096 acres.
Refuses to enforce stupid, unworkable law.
The Clean Heat Standard can’t be implemented without additional legislative approval, a key House committee chair concedes.
Vermont Public’s propaganda superficially simplifies a complex issue into ‘the Democrats want climate policy and the Republicans are pushing back’.
Systems that can deliver reliable power at the scales necessary for robust growth remain anchored in precisely the fuels the transitionists want to abandon.
The Huntsville, Ontario school bus built by Lion Electric of Quebec was packed with students when the driver began to notice problems. He ordered the kids off the bus.
Experts, including the former Director of the National Security Agency, warn that these devices could be used to bypass cybersecurity protections, remotely manipulate grid-connected equipment, and potentially trigger blackouts across parts of the country.
Democrats leaders in the State House grudgingly accepted a pit stop in the race to zero emissions, but only for trucks.
Are offshore wind turbines for the birds?
If there’s any benefit at all, it doesn’t get back to the people paying the bills.
In an effort to provide a perspective from people who are not part of the choir and are not engaging with you, I endeavor to channel what you might hear, if you could find a way.
Special interests have issued their marching orders, and the Democrats are obeying.
A vote to repeal the Clean Heat Standard will be held in the Vermont Senate this afternoon. The vote will be close and Lt. Gov. John Rodgers has said he will cast the tie-breaking vote in favor of repeal.
There are actually multiple coal burning electricity plants in the USA that individually produce up to 5X Vermont’s annual emissions! One single plant!
And it’s not even working to reduce fossil fuel use.
An open letter to the Vermont Senate and House energy committees
Maybe it’s not about carbon at all.
Maybe it’s about keeping the system alive—no matter how expensive, ineffective, or ungrateful it becomes.
Lawmakers can’t open $ million-plus spigot to pay for hopeless lawsuit.
Policy will cost Vermonters money, jobs, tax revenue, and likely increase emissions.
Senate Republicans showed they now have the swing to back a potential veto by Gov. Phil Scott of too-aggressive carbon reduction legislation.
Low-income, rural Vermonters hit hardest; no safety net program possible.
Bill obliterated in four hours of critical testimony; passes committees anyway.
“We’re very concerned that this mandate for Efficiency Vermont will actually drive up our cost,” Ken Nolan of VPPSA said.
“S.65 is legally unsound because it contains internally conflicting standards and creates a regulatory morass likely to result in litigation,” says the Public Utilities Commission.
Vermonters deserve to know if politicians are using manipulation and rhetoric to push unpopular, expensive agendas.
Lawmakers’ arrogance, stubbornness, and fiscal irresponsibility on full display with H.125
“I run a small propane company in Proctor, Vermont with 11 employees. I’m one of the 11. I’m the ‘Big Oil’ they’re talking about,” Judy Taranovich joked.
EVENT TODAY! There is a rally at the State House 12-1 pm calling on the legislature to REPEAL ACT 18.
What is missing is how much follow-up the Legislature and Administration are doing to see how the funds are being applied. So little is publicized.
Originally published Tuesday May 3, 2022. In 1960-61 McClaughry was a reactor physicist in GE’s Atomic Power Equipment Division.
Also under consideration: no more renewable energy credit purchases for nuclear power, and regional cooperation to reprioritize nuclear power over off-shore wind.
“If Mr. Trump implements tariffs, we do not rule out joint retaliation on, among other things, electricity exported to the United States,” Legault said.
Vermonters expected quick action in 2025 to wipe Act 18 (the Clean Heat Standard law) from the books. That has not happened.
A provision in Act 18 requires that the program’s detailed rules and implementation plan be developed by the Public Utility Commission and should come back to the Vermont Legislature for review and approval in 2025.
Sales of gasoline and diesel fuel for transportation may have actually increased, a state report says.
“The voters told us loudly that they want us to do something,” Sen. Randy Brock (R-Franklin) said.
“You have folks doing storage. I don’t know why storage is mentioned in S.65. I don’t think it’s necessary,” Ed McNamara, Chair of the PUC, said.
Either pass laws that will meet GWSA mandates or repeal the mandates.
The State of Vermont’s climate change budget gets 80% of its funding from the feds. Will the state’s push for fossil-free energy run out of gas?
“I’m gonna flap my arms and fly over the Statehouse dome. And if I should fail, I will punch myself in the face.” That is the essence of Vermont’s Global Warming Solutions Act.
Getting hearings so early represents progress compared to how the issues raised by these bills were downplayed or ignored last session under the Supermajority.
“A 10% tariff on Canadian energy is a concern for Vermont’s energy sector, and this could impact energy rates in Vermont,” Vermont Fuel said.
CHS may have flatlined, but we’re still stuck with the GWSA mandates.
A reflection on our age of carbon indulgences
Part 3: PUC report lays bare why Clean Heat Standard is totally unworkable.
Reps. Jim Harrison (R-Chittenden), Jed Lipsky (I-Stowe), and Kristi Morris (D-Springfield) cosponsored the bill, H.52
Once you strip away all the bells, whistles, and unnecessary complexity of “clean heat credits” and “credit exchanges,” the Clean Heat Standard is and always was just a Rube Goldberg carbon tax on how we heat our homes.
The problem with that argument is that a home with a brand-new heat pump and $10k worth of weatherization improvements that is located in a floodplain isn’t any more resilient to being destroyed than one with an old oil furnace that’s insulated with corn cobs.
Set to launch in late 2025, the initiative aims to lower electricity costs by 20% for many low-income and underserved Vermonters through solar.
PUC rules account for just the first ten years of a 25-year program, which will get progressively more expensive as time goes by.
“It’s not a fundamentally wrong program, we just don’t think it’s a good fit for Vermont”, said Commissioner McNamara.
EU “deindustrialization” pummels economic growth.
The federally funded ‘all-solar’ initiative (more on that in an upcoming story by Paul Bean) comprises about 10% of that figure.
Clean Heat Standard repeal kicked over to Committee controlled by those who made it law in the first place.
Vermont’s Secretary Agency of Natural Resources is now being sued on ‘both sides’ of the political spectrum for a law seeking to recover billions from Big Oil.
Rather than take voters’ cue to slow down on expensive energy policy, EAN urges the Legislature to stay the course with the fossil-fuel to electricity transition at home and on the roads. But even leading climate hawks in the Senate aren’t so sure.
