NextEra has a lot of chutzpah.
The Florida-based company portrays itself as one of the largest clean energy companies in the country, but for the last several years it has been doing everything it can to prevent the construction of a Massachusetts-financed transmission line carrying hydroelectricity from Quebec to New England.
The company spent more than $20 million supporting a 2021 ballot question that retroactively blocked the New England Clean Energy Connect transmission line. And last week two settlement agreements released by the Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices disclosed that NextEra years before that was secretly funding efforts to halt construction of the transmission line.
In one instance, NextEra secretly funded a group called Stop the Corridor that was advancing a 2020 referendum to block the transmission line. The company also was identified as the source of funding for $150,000 funneled through a series of intermediaries to the Maine Democratic Party prior to a 2018 election that gave Democrats control of the Legislature and the governor’s office. The money was used for get-out-the-vote efforts.
According to findings of fact released by the Maine ethics commission, consultants retained on behalf of NextEra “viewed Democratic officials as more likely to oppose the NECEC project.”
All of NextEra’s efforts ultimately failed. A 2020 referendum seeking to halt the transmission line was deemed unconstitutional by the Maine Supreme Judicial Court before it went to voters. And while the 2021 ballot question that sought to block the project was approved by 59 percent of Maine voters, the state supreme court tossed out the results in August 2022. The court held that the referendum law was unconstitutional because it deprived Avangrid, the company building the transmission line, of rights that had already vested.
New England Clean Energy Connect is back under construction in Maine, but the delays have driven up the cost of the project. Massachusetts electricity ratepayers will have to bear that extra cost.
Indeed, the closeout spending bill approved by the Legislature and signed by Gov. Maura Healey on Monday contains a provision authorizing the Department of Public Utilities to determine how much more ratepayers should be assessed.
NextEra has never fully explained its strategy to block the Maine transmission line, but it’s presumed the company is acting in its own self-interest. NextEra owns the nuclear power plant Seabrook Station in New Hampshire and an oil-fired power plant in Maine, both of which are expected to lose significant market share and revenue if hydroelectricity from Quebec starts flowing into New England.
Avangrid issued a statement condemning NextEra’s actions. “The findings presented by the Maine ethics commission provide direct and disturbing evidence that NextEra took nefarious and deceitful action to exclude competition and put its own bottom line ahead of the interests of New England residents and businesses,” the company said.
“The resource strain, reliability concerns, and high costs that plague New England every winter are well-documented,” it continued. “In that context, a company engaging in these unethical tactics by initiating a misinformation campaign and disguising it as community opposition to prevent new, needed resources from entering the region, putting its own self-interest ahead of the customers it is meant to serve, is a betrayal of everyone working to build a better, more sustainable clean energy future.”
