Dear Editor,
This letter is in response to the op-ed article the Westfield News recently ran on October 6 entitled “Our Electricity Grid is Bending, Without Change it Will Break” where the author Marc Brown wrote of the rising energy rates in New England, the growing concern about increased reliance on natural gas for electricity generation and the potential for catastrophic impacts to the electricity grid such as rolling blackouts. There is, and will continue to be, a capacity shortfall due to insufficient natural gas transmission facilities in the Northeast. This shortage is further compounded by the retirement of existing generation facilities that are scheduled to occur over the next few years. The upcoming retirements of Vermont Yankee and Brayton Point, together with the prolonged delay of the New Salem Harbor natural gas fired plant, are definite causes for concern.
This is an issue that we, as members of the Municipal Light Board, along with the Westfield Gas and Electric Department, have been monitoring for several years and have made a conscious effort to alert our ratepayers to the pending crisis which ultimately did impact New England over the past two winters when transmission costs assessed by suppliers skyrocketed during peak demand periods. Sadly, the expectation is that this will occur again in the coming months and over the next 4-5 years or more until much needed extra gas transportation and electric base load power is added to New England.
These warnings, along with those issued by ISO-New England who operates the grid, have finally begun to gain traction and notice on the part of legislators and regulators. The recent announcement of a 37 percent electric rate increase for customers of National Grid further drove the point home. Projects are now on the drawing board and progressing to the permitting phase yet are meeting resistance and opposition from the communities that will be impacted by any new infrastructure construction.
There is no easy and fast solution to this predicament and the road ahead is going to be rocky. However, the WG+E will continue to take proactive steps to moderate any impact to our ratepayers and to provide our customers with the reliable, safe and competitively priced services to which they’re accustomed.
Sincerely,
Municipal Light Board Commissioners
Thomas P. Flaherty, Chair
Kevin M. Kelleher
?Francis L. Liptak
?????Ray Rivera??
A. Edward Roman?????
Robert C. Sacco?
Jane Wensley????
Daniel J. Howard
General Manager
