Challenges for Mass. and New York
Charles Berckmann is an assistant vice president in Moody’s Global Project & Infrastructure Finance Group. He is the lead analyst for a diverse portfolio of power project financings and several public power utilities. Berckmann joined Moody’s in May 2007.
California has long been the leader in utilizing state-level governmental mandates as a means of meeting environmental goals. Indeed, the state's energy policies have flooded the wholesale market with subsidized renewable generation, wreaking havoc on the economics of merchant generation with a large oversupply of electricity in the state. Moody's Investors Service now sees Massachusetts and New York emulating California's policies as a means of stimulating renewable generation.
Charles Berckmann, an assistant vice president at Moody's, coauthored a report examining both states' initiatives, and here addresses some key questions for PUF.
What are New York and Massachusetts doing to stimulate the growth of electricity generation from renewable sources?
In the second half of 2016, both states signaled their renewable energy aspirations for the near future. Massachusetts passed the "Act to Promote Energy Diversity" on August 1, 2016. That requires utilities operating in the state to generate at least twenty-eight hundred megawatts of clean energy from solar, wind and hydro over the next decade.
On the same day, New York adopted a Clean Energy Standard, which requires among other things that fifty percent of New York's electricity come from solar, wind and hydro by 2030.