Assessment
Massachusetts made considerable progress in reducing emissions in the power sector due to its historic and nation-leading laws, regulations, and programs to promote clean energy and reduce emissions from power plants. The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, state portfolio standards, long-term clean energy procurements, and solar incentive programs have resulted in about half of Massachusetts’ electric load being met with clean power today. However, the Commonwealth has more recently faced serious barriers to further emission reductions. Global economic disruptions resulted in developers terminating three contracts for 2,400 MW of offshore wind, while the construction of the 1,200 MW New England Clean Energy Connect (NECEC) transmission line that will provide hydroelectric energy to Massachusetts was delayed by legal challenges. While Massachusetts continues to pursue the 1,878 MW from recently selected offshore wind projects and plans for another procurement in 2025, which combined would more than make up for the terminated wind contracts, projected commercial operation dates have been pushed back. These delays in clean energy deployment, and the scale of clean energy generation required to support transportation and building electrification, reiterate the importance of continued forward-thinking action. Priorities include implementing siting and permitting reforms, providing the Commonwealth with additional long-term contracting authority for clean energy sources, implementing the Mass Leads Act, reducing barriers to solar deployment, and improving portfolio standard requirements and power sector emissions tracking for municipal light plants.
| Metrics | 2023 Report Value | 2024 Report Value | Target |
|---|---|---|---|
| Percent of state electricity consumption met with clean power [1] | 48.2% of the state’s electricity consumption was met with in-state and out-of-state clean sources in 2021. | 50.0% of the state’s electricity consumption was met with in-state and out-of-state clean sources in 2022. | Massachusetts has multiple standards that require a certain percentage of electricity served to customers come from clean resources in the regional market. In 2022, the combined standards required that more than 54% of all electric load in Eversource’s, National Grid’s and Unitil’s service territories be sourced from qualified clean and renewable energy resources. The standards do not apply to the electricity served by municipal light plants (MLPs) or wholesale purchases of electricity (e.g., most of the electricity consumed by the MBTA) that account for over 14% of total electricity consumption statewide. However, a value of 50.0% for statewide clean electricity in 2022 indicates the standards were similarly achieved in the MLPs service territories as in investor-owned utility service territories. |
| In-state renewable electric capacity | There were 113 MW of in-state wind capacity in 2022. There were 3,325 MW AC of in-state solar capacity in 2022. | There were 110 MW of in-state wind capacity in 2023.[2] There were 4,023 MW AC of in-state solar capacity in 2023. | The 2025/2030 CECP modeling estimates 180 MW of wind capacity (all onshore) in 2025 and 3,650 MW of wind capacity (onshore and offshore combined) in 2030 as necessary to achieve the power sector emissions sublimit. The 2025/2030 CECP modeling estimates 4,470 MW alternating current (AC) of solar capacity will be needed by 2025 and 8,360 MW AC of solar capacity will be needed by 2030 to achieve the power sector emissions sublimit. This metric measures clean energy capacity in Massachusetts, but Massachusetts is part of a regional electric grid operated by ISO-New England (ISO-NE) that is supplied by power generation facilities located throughout New England and in neighboring regions. Accordingly, the amount of clean energy generated within the state, while a useful indicator of progress towards meeting power sector emissions limits, is less important than the amount of clean energy generated in or delivered to ISO-NE that Massachusetts can claim was consumed in state, regardless of where it was generated. |
[1] This is documented via the retirement of clean energy attributes, direct contracts with municipal light plants, and an estimate of Massachusetts’ share of imported energy from neighboring regions.
[2] Two wind facilities were decommissioned. MWRA turbine at Deer Island and an Applied Materials' turbine in Gloucester.
Challenges
- Delivery of offshore wind energy is delayed several years due to macroeconomic forces resulting in the termination of previous contracts with projects on the east coast. Massachusetts has selected new projects as part of a subsequent procurement coordinated with other states but expected commercial operation dates are later than under previous contracts.
- Out-of-state clean energy resources like nuclear facilities, onshore wind, and hydropower will help Massachusetts achieve its emissions limits. While An Act Promoting a Clean Energy Grid, Advancing Equity, and Protecting Ratepayers (St. 2024 c. 239) provides additional procurement authority to support the development or continued operation of these resources if the Commonwealth works with regional partners in 2025, additional procurement authority is needed beyond 2025.
- Revenues from existing energy market structures are not certain enough to enable long-term financing of new, clean generation outside state-run procurements.
- Utilities have traditionally been incentivized to build new infrastructure as opposed to optimizing use of the existing electric grid, managing demand, or encouraging distributed resources like solar and storage. New utility planning models, such as the Electric Sector Modernization Plans (ESMPs) approved by the DPU in 2024, are needed to ensure utilities are incentivized to meet climate goals proactively. More work must still be done to improve upon these initial plans and to establish the proper incentives for utilities to optimize the use of existing and new electric grid infrastructure.
- Municipal light plants (MLPs), which provide electricity to 13% of Massachusetts customers, have less stringent requirements to report their emissions and procure clean energy over time than investor-owned utilities.
- Solar projects sited in the built environment, like roof-mounted and parking canopy projects, are much more popular and have fewer environmental and land use impacts than ground-mounted projects but are higher-cost and face unique obstacles to deployment that must be overcome.
- Energy storage development is hindered by siting, financing, and interconnection barriers, including lack of proper compensation frameworks for the value storage provides to the grid.
How we are meeting this moment
- In November, Governor Healey signed An Act Promoting a Clean Energy Grid, Advancing Equity, and Protecting Ratepayers (St. 2024 c. 239). This law includes reforms to improve and streamline siting and permitting for clean energy infrastructure as recommended by the Commission on Clean Energy Infrastructure Siting and Permitting. It also expands clean energy procurement authority for Department of Energy Resources (DOER), creates a requirement to procure 5,000 MW of energy storage by 2030, improves access to solar, and promotes demand management and grid efficiency to reduce the cost and amount of electricity that is needed to meet customer demands.
- In September, Massachusetts and Rhode Island jointly selected 2,878 megawatts of offshore wind, the largest procurement of offshore wind in New England history. While one 800 MW project withdrew from contract negotiations, the remaining projects continue to make progress towards entering into contracts.
- The Department of Public Utilities (DPU) has approved nine Capital Investment Project proposals submitted by Eversource and National Grid, which will allow for hundreds of additional MW of solar and storage to be interconnected to the electric distribution system. The DPU is still reviewing two Capital Investment Project proposals and expects to receive more soon.
- The DPU approved the investor-owned utilities’ Electric Sector Modernization Plans, which include investments designed to modernize the electric grid and increase the state’s ability to decarbonize safely, equitably, and efficiently. As part of that order, the DPU ordered utilities to create a Long-term System Planning Program (LTSPP) working group to develop a more proactive distribution system planning process to support deployment of clean energy and mitigate interconnection challenges. The Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs (EEA) and DOER are identifying additional areas of work and collaborating with electric utilities and industry stakeholders to further address interconnection challenges and examine ways to expand and improve demand response programs.
- Massachusetts and other New England states were awarded $389 million from the DOE’s Grid Innovation Program for the Power Up New England project, which will sponsor investments in large-scale transmission and energy storage infrastructure that will ready the onshore transmission system for up to 4,800 megawatts of additional offshore wind and provide critical reliability benefits to the regional grid. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency also awarded Massachusetts $156 million in Solar for All funding to make solar more accessible for small residential and multifamily homes and expand access to community solar.
- In partnership with the other New England states and the region’s grid operator, EEA’s Office of Federal and Regional Energy Affairs (FREA) helped lead the development and implementation of a first-in-the-nation, state-driven regional transmission procurement process that will unlock potentially thousands of megawatts of new onshore wind resources and meet growing system demand.
- Massachusetts entered into a memorandum of understanding in July 2024, to establish a bipartisan framework for coordinating activities among ten states on interregional transmission planning and development as a means to enhance grid reliability and accelerate the clean energy transition.
- In partnership with other Northeast states, Massachusetts successfully advocated to expand eligibility for the Inflation Reduction Act’s Energy Communities (EC) Bonus Credit to support offshore wind and lower consumer costs.
- In July, DOER released a straw proposal of changes to the Commonwealth’s solar incentive program, the Solar Massachusetts Renewable Target (SMART) Program, to better support the growth of solar. It plans to build upon this straw proposal by advancing regulatory changes via a rulemaking in 2025.