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MAINE COMPASS: Let Mainers, not the state, decide their energy future

Recent headlines suggested that the Maine energy marketers, whose Maine family-owned companies represent more than 12,000 Maine-based employees, were opposed to offshore wind power development because they opposed LD 1810, an Act to Implement the Recommendations of the Offshore Energy Task Force.

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We clearly stated at the hearing that we were not opposed to offshore wind power development.

This 36-page “emergency” bill, however, released one week before the Utilities and Energy Committee had to finish its work, has many sections that need consideration.

One section of the bill requires electric utilities to buy 20-year contracts for electricity for this yet-undeveloped wind power, with the only caveat that it does not “unreasonably affect rates.”

We were not among those who pointed out the state’s dismal track record of the past 30 years of picking winners and losers in the electricity generation business, directly causing Maine’s electricity prices to be some of the highest in the country.

Nor was our issue the opposition stated by some lobstermen about the irregularities in the permitting process section, nor was the opposition from the chairwoman of the Marine Resources committee.

Rep. Leila Percy, D-Phippsburg, who said this bill requires much more time to digest and should at least go to her committee — next year — for review because of the monumental issues raised about near-shore wind siting.

The energy marketer community limited its opposition to the sections that directed the Department of Environmental Protection to implement a new public policy using “taxpayer funds” to convert Maine citizens away from oil, natural gas and propane to electricity for heat starting in 2012.

Current electricity costs of 15 cents per kilowatt-hour are comparable $5.25 per gallon equivalent heating oil, and the Ocean Energy Task Force Report says the technology does not yet exist to develop deep-water wind generation.

The report also states that, if implemented, the recommendations of the task force will increase electricity rates.

Developers testified that near-shore wind would cost at least 22 cents per kwh. Cape Wind projects in Rhode Island recently revealed that its power would cost between 25 and 30 cents per kwh.

Conversion to electric heating would cost the equivalent of at least $5.25 per gallon heating oil today, with the price rising to more than $10 per gallon at the near-offshore wind prices.

No one knows what deep-water wind electric prices will be.

The average cost of heating oil this year is $2.80; for the past 20 years, it has been significantly below $2 per  gallon.

In addition, this conversion section of the bill would extinguish existing Maine energy companies and the more than 12,000 jobs that they provide,

Maine energy marketers have been competing and evolving for more than 100 years, bringing the people of Maine the most affordable energy to heat their homes and to power their vehicles.

These companies offer many different fuels: heating oil (primarily made in the United States and Canada), biofuels (which can be and are made in Maine), propane, wood products, solar applications, electric, motor fuels — and the most advanced proven technologies that will reduce consumers’ usage, emissions and costs dramatically.

Has the road at times been bumpy? Yes. But overall, people have chosen to heat their homes the way they want — not as they are forced by the government or anyone else.

When heating oil reached $4 per gallon for six months in 2008, many people recognized that conservation, weatherization and equipment upgrades were the most cost-effective ways to reduce consumption and costs.

Our local businesses have reduced fuel usage from 1,500 gallons to an average 850 gallons during the last 30 years. In effect, we already have reduced CO2 emissions by 40 percent.

New technologies exist that can lower usage another 20 percent to 40 percent.

Had the government forced conversion to electric heat as it tried years ago, Maine people would have been paying triple the amount to heat their homes for the last 30 years.

Will electric heat be successful in the future? It is possible. Homeowners, however, should be able to make that choice based on the competition in the market.

If offshore wind has a future, the state’s energy marketers are not standing in its way, nor are we opposed to it, as we made clear at the public hearing on LD 1810.

We think that state policy and money should not be used to eliminate the 12,000 jobs of those who work in the home-heating solutions business, nor should millions of dollars of assets and infrastructure be invested to support the business.

Maine people know how to spend their money more wisely than government. That was our opposition.

Jamie Py is the president of the Maine Energy Marketers Association.