Category Archives: Energy

Why Maine’s fight over solar power billing isn’t going away, in charts

Maine, with about 29 times the land mass of Rhode Island, had only 1.4 times the Ocean State’s power generated from small-scale solar energy installations last year. The potential to boost solar power in Maine, and its recent rapid growth, illustrate why the fight over how to pay small solar generators won’t go away any time soon. At its heart, the debate is about fairness […]

Gas and oil may be cheap, but Mainers still spent gobs on them

While gasoline prices have dipped to surprising lows, oil-heavy Maine households still spent more on it and other energy commodities than almost every other state. Maine had the third-highest per-capita cost for gasoline and other energy goods, not including utilities like electricity or piped natural gas. It was behind the other small and cold states of North Dakota and Wyoming for those […]

Maine led nation for drop in fossil-fuel carbon emissions

Maine’s carbon dioxide emissions dropped the most of any state from 2000 to 2013, according to an analysis of fossil fuel-related emissions by the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The analysis factors in total emissions from burning fossil fuels and does not include generation from biomass, which made up about 27.3 percent of the state’s total generation capacity in 2013. Maine was […]

Census: Maine homes continue switch from heating oil

For better or for worse, homeowners continued to shift away from heating their homes with No. 2 oil as more install natural gas and propane systems. Data released Thursday from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey show the share of Maine homes using heating oil dropped by a statistically significant amount in 2014, as falling crude oil prices lowered heating oil […]

Where the sun does shine (and generate power) in Maine

Maine doesn’t have any grid-scale solar projects online, but it does punch above its weight for installed solar capacity, according to one database. I took a look at those state-level figures for a story on Maine Beer Co.’s recently installed solar arrays in Freeport and the town’s broader effort to get a batch of businesses to go in together on […]

Today on the auction block: carbon emission allowances

The 25th carbon allowance auction through the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) starting today is bringing out supporters and opponents of the Northeast cap-and-trade program. Supporters like the Natural Resources Council of Maine argue that the nearly $50 million paid by Maine producers for carbon allowances have supported investments that will provide long-term environmental and economic returns (they debuted two case studies […]

Everybody has something to say about offshore wind development

The National Wildlife Federation has updated a 2010 assessment of offshore wind development along the East Coast in a report that calls for states bordering the Atlantic Ocean to set ambitious offshore wind power goals, invest in research and establish a competitive market for that power. Before I run through all the details, let me try and […]