Environmental group, gas terminal owners fight pipeline ruling

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http://www.bostonherald.com/business/business_markets/2015/10/environmental_group_gas_terminal_owners_fight_pipeline_ruling



UNLIKELY ALLIES: The natural gas tanker Catalunya Spirit is seen above as it sails in Boston Harbor in 2006. The owners of an Everett natural gas terminal and an environmental group are both fighting a ruling that would allow electric distribution companies the OK to invest in natural gas pipelines with ratepayers taking on the risk.

Environmental group, gas terminal owners fight pipeline ruling
Brian Dowling Wednesday, October 28, 2015

The owners of Everett’s massive natural gas import terminal and an environmental group are working on parallel tracks to block efforts to use Massachusetts ratepayers as a financial backstop for new interstate gas pipelines.

Both have asked the Supreme Judicial Court to review a Department of Public Utilities decision made earlier this month that gives electric distribution companies — such as Eversource Energy and National Grid — the OK to make multibillion-dollar investments in natural gas pipelines with ratepayers footing the bill if things go sour.

David Ismay, staff attorney with the Conservation Law Foundation, filed one of the appeals and told the Herald having electric ratepayers shoulder the risk runs counter to the state’s energy policy.

“It was a deliberate policy position to not place those burdens on the ratepayer, but to place them on the generators,” he said.