Gov ‘gaslighting’ on pipelines, critic says

Governor Maura Healey is again changing her position on the two natural gas pipelines she stopped as Attorney General as ability costs continue to soar and strengthen its grip on the Bay State In a one-on-one interview with NBC Boston on Friday Healey was solicited about her stoppage of the two pipelines to be built and operated by ability infrastructure giants Kinder Morgan and Access Northeast when she was attorney general The governor acknowledged that she stopped the pipelines because they were a lousy deal They were a lousy deal for ratepayers and I ve got to stand up for people in Massachusetts I thought it was wrong for ratepayers people residents taxpayers in Massachusetts to foot the bill for those pipelines instead of the pipeline companies Healey narrated the infrastructure This comes just a month after the governor deflected blame for stopping the gas pipelines When sought by the Herald if stopping the two pipelines contributed to soaring vitality costs in the Bay State Healey announced Well first of all I didn t do that going on to blame President Donald Trump s tariffs on Canadian goods for the rising utility costs The Herald solicited for clarification on Healey s conflicting statements to which her office again blamed the lousy deal offered to the state arguing that she defended ratepayers from Kinder Morgan and Access Northeast s attempts to pass billions in new pipeline infrastructure costs on to electric ratepayers Maura Healey stood up for ratepayers over corporate profits As Attorney General Maura Healey argued that ratepayers should not foot the bill for corporate developers After she successfully argued that the companies chose to walk away They could have moved forward with the project if they were willing to pay for it themselves not with ratepayer dollars disclosed Gov Healey s Spokesperson Karissa Hand who did not provide an explanation as to why Healey has gone back and forth on accepting responsibility for stopping the pipeline projects Hand also tells the Herald that the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court held that the arrangement would have violated state law She also cited an outside analysis conducted by Synapse Electricity Economics Inc that estimated the Access Northeast project to cost billion She also cited Kinder Morgan s own cost estimates for its project of to billion But during a Federal Strength Regulatory Commission FERC forum in September leadership at Kinder Morgan claimed if their pipeline project had been allowed to advance it would have saved ratepayers billions of dollars Had that project gone in operation which it was targeted for November it would have saved the region Billion between November of and in the current era announced Kinder Morgan President Kimberly Watson during the FERC New England Winter Gas Electric Forum That is a major amount of money Natural gas is affordable it is reliable and it is plentiful in the United States In a project overview Access Northeast noted New England ratepayers could have saved billion annually during normal winter weather if their project had proceeded Healey s current Secretary of the Executive Office of Force and Environmental Affairs Rebecca Tepper represented the Attorney General s office during that forum and defended the move to stop the pipelines arguing that Massachusetts was relying too heavily on natural gas We re overly dependent on a single fuel We re overly dependent on natural gas and the entire region is at exposure anytime we have particular kind of disruption on that system Tepper reported We ve often tried to address the complication of reliance on one fuel by saying let s have more natural gas First it was a pipeline and looking back on it now you know thank goodness we didn t do that because we would be even more dependent on natural gas than we are in the current era Spokesman for the Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance Paul Craney tells the Herald that stopping natural gas infrastructure has been one of Healey s top priorities over the past decade Its hard to keep track with her various positions of shutting down two pipelines but the fact of the matter is that everyone knows her record as attorney general and three years into the governor s office This was one of her top priorities for the past decade to stop the natural gas expansion into Massachusetts and New England and to stop any maintenance of this infrastructure Craney revealed If Governor Healey s actions met her rhetoric we would be more hopeful But her latest response over the weekend is nothing more than gaslighting Massachusetts ratepayers Healey had originally bragged about stopping the pipelines during her campaign for governor During an event on WBUR in April of that year now widely circulated online the then-Attorney General reminded the audience she stopped the pipelines Remember I stopped two gas pipelines from coming into this state Healey explained before going on to say she opposes building more gas infrastructure Experts say the absence of regional natural gas pipelines coming into Massachusetts combined with state policies and mandates have been driving increasing ability costs Last month the Fiscal Alliance Foundation disclosed a record that concluded state-mandated environment and power programs are to blame for the sharp rise in electric bills in Massachusetts The description Massachusetts Electric Costs The Real Source of the Concern authored by power agenda analyst Lisa Linowes and circulated by the Fiscal Alliance Foundation uncovered that agenda surcharges included in electric rates have quadrupled since bringing the average monthly household electric bill from in to a whopping in early It says these program surcharges now account for nearly one-third of every dollar on residential electric bills with solar incentives renewable mandates and energy-efficiency surcharges accounting for the steepest cost increases That s nearly double the rate of inflation In the same period costs tied to renewable mandates carbon programs and energy-efficiency surcharges grew from to per month Healey s change in stance on the pipeline issue also came after debate flared surrounding a bill H filed by state Rep Mark Cusak D-Braintree that seeks to lower costs but would weaken the state s state mandate according to critics Situation activists have voiced opposition against the bill saying it would represent a important step backward for both affordability and environment progress The rule now sits with the House Methods and Means Committee where the chairman anticipates revisions Earlier this year Governor Healey expressed sponsorship for a supply contract to expand quota of the existing Algonquin pipeline Under this proposal her office says Eversource gas ratepayers would pay only for the increased supply and Enbridge would finance the expansion