Alex Kuffner The Providence Journal
PROVIDENCE — Rhode Island’s dominant energy utility is pushing back against legislation requiring it to solicit offers for more offshore wind power, saying that it needs more money from ratepayers than state leaders would allow.
In a hearing this week, representatives of National Grid, which serves 780,000 gas and electric customers in the state, came out against the bill, telling legislators that a financial incentive in the measure falls short of what the company would need to protect its bottom line.
The legislation, submitted on behalf of Gov. Dan McKee, would set the incentive payment to the utility at 2% of the total value of a power-purchase agreement. With recent offshore-wind contracts worth billions of dollars, the payment to the utility would be in the tens of millions of dollars. All of it would be paid by electric ratepayers and would come on top of what they pay for the energy delivered to them.