Solar and storage is the cheapest and fastest way to meet energy demands in Massachusetts and the rest of New England, according to solar industry leaders and the Healey administration, but establishing a wider path for that energy source remains up for discussion.
“Massachusetts used to be one of the top states for solar installation, and now we’re in the middle of the pack. I want to change that,” Gov. Maura Healey told a panel of energy and labor figures on Monday at a “solar summit” in downtown Boston.
“There’s only so much we can control as a state. We can’t control all of what’s happening at the federal level, but my job and the job of this team in this room, including industry, is to figure out, what are things that we can operationalize here that we have control over?” Healey said.
President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill adjusts the availability of tax credits for clean energy development, which “is going to increase energy costs dramatically over the next three-to-five years,” said Zaid Ashai, CEO of Boston-based national clean energy company Nexamp.
“We need to find solutions where grid investment is not only made based on ratepayers and utility rate cases, but we need a longer-term vision. We can’t burden generations with the future of the grid. And that future of the grid is not only for new energy coming online, it’s for data centers, electric vehicles, heating,” Ashai said.
Trump administration policies have aimed to end or shift several types of renewable energy production, including solar and offshore wind. Federal officials are scrutinizing several offshore wind projects that the state has long deemed necessary to meet clean energy mandates. Attorney General Andrea Campbell’s office has been involved in a lawsuit challenging a January directive from Trump ordering federal officials to not issue permits for wind projects before a certain assessment.
Trump administration officials said on Monday that the federal government will expand millions of acres of federal land for coal mine leasing, according to reporting from Reuters.
Healey said Monday that Trump administration policies have “been restricting supply and driving up costs,” from slowing energy permitting timelines to creating “political roadblocks” for energy development and imposing tariffs on industry materials.
“We have a naysayer in D.C.,” Ashai said. “How do we create a different solar ecosystem that can complement the various forms of energy — land, hydro, nuclear, among others? My hope, sort of coming out of the summit, is that stakeholders, industry, government, utilities, can create a blueprint that’s an example for the rest of the country.”
The state could put policies in place, Bronte Payne, senior policy manager for renewable energy company SunRun said, to streamline permitting and interconnection for home solar and storage. Establishing automated instant permitting in cities and towns that are code-compliant and meet safety requirements, Payne said, could be one way to boost development.
“Access to home storage is at a really important inflection point, as everyone in this room knows, with the federal residential clean energy tax credit being eliminated at the end of the year and the investment tax credit ending after 2027,” Payne explained.
“Right now, individual customers are asked to bear the full cost of upgrades, even though many small solar customers benefit from these grid improvements,” Payne said. Creating a common fee to allocate the cost of upgrades across solar customers could help more families benefit from solar and storage, she added. Clear standards and requirements statewide could also enable more residences to install home storage.
Healey filed an energy affordability bill (H 4144) in May, proposing to save ratepayers $10 billion in energy costs over a decade. The bill would also allow Massachusetts to look into new nuclear energy technologies, change electricity procurement and supply practices, and reform the competitive electric supply industry.
The proposal has remained before the Committee on Telecommunications, Energy and Utilities since its June hearing. The bill is not subject to the Legislature’s new 60-day reporting deadline because it was filed by the governor.
Asked Monday if her administration is open to rethinking any of the solar proposals within the legislation, Healey told reporters that “We didn’t get everything perfect, but we’re here today to talk to people about that,” before stating that “everything’s on the table” and again promoting an “all-of-the-above” energy approach.
“Solar is the cheapest and fastest form of energy that we can get built right now. And if you think about it, after it’s up, there are no fuel costs, right? So that’s why it’s so great for residential customers. Once you have solar on your roof, all you have is savings,” Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Rebecca Tepper said.
Behind-the-meter solar panels on homes and businesses have been generating enough electricity to satisfy a significant share of New England’s electricity consumption while lessening demand on the grid. Demand for electricity from the region’s grid reached a record-low level in April, for example, partially as a result of rooftop solar panel production.
“Solar energy in Massachusetts, on the hottest single day of summer this year — behind-the-meter solar, which is the solar on our roofs and farms and schools — met 22% of statewide demand. That’s what’s keeping our air conditioners running and our lights on. That’s $8 million in savings alone on that one day,” Healey said Monday.
The Healey administration in June filed emergency regulations for the Solar Massachusetts Renewable Target (SMART) program in an attempt to lower costs, adjust permitting, speed up interconnection processes and increase energy brought into the state.
The overhaul of the program, according to Jessica Robertson, director of policy and business development for New Leaf Energy, means Massachusetts “is poised to outpace most other states in solar deployment.”
“Massachusetts is in a better position than any state in the country to continue to unleash a surge in solar development right now, while a federal tax credit is still available, and then to figure out a new playbook for the post-ITC era,” Robertson said. Speeding up permitting reform and implementation while federal programs are still in play, she added, are among necessary steps ahead.
“It’s interesting because solar has gone gangbusters in places like Texas and Florida,” Healey said, adding that her focus remains on how to get energy into the region to lower costs.
“It’s absolutely essential to what we need to do if we’re going to think about the ways in which — just think about how much you, yourself, as an individual, consume in terms of energy every day, on your computer, on your tablet, on your smartphone. Like, our need for energy just continues to grow exponentially.”
