By FRANK CARINI/ecoRI News staff
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| Patricia Morgan at the microphone. Blake Filippi behind her right shoulder (RIPR photo) |
Rep. Morgan, R-West Warwick, says a stalled Algonquin Gas pipeline
project needs to be reactivated to help Rhode Island residents and businesses
have a better life and be more successful.
EDITOR’S
NOTE: Charlestown’s state Representative Blake Filippi is a long-time major
donor to Rep. Morgan to whom he also owes his current position as House
Minority Whip. The Charlestown Town Council recently voted unanimously to
oppose the notorious Burrillville gas plant. The Charlestown Citizens Alliance
has been Filippi’s staunchest backer. – W. Collette
In the Jan. 26 letter Morgan wrote, “a proposed and much
needed pipeline has been bogged down for years during the Obama administration,
presumably for climate change reasons. Rhode Island families, businesses and I
need your help moving this project to fruition.”
As part of its collection of regional natural gas-expansion
projects, the Houston-based Spectra Energy Corp. had requested to enlarge a compressor station in
Burrillville by adding
two more gas-powered engines, which would help propel natural gas along the
1,127-mile Algonquin pipeline that runs from New Jersey to Massachusetts.
There also has been talk of building another natural-gas pipeline
“across New York and Connecticut to increase inadequate gas supplies to our
state,” according to Morgan.
In a press release posted Jan. 30 on the State of Rhode Island General Assembly website touting her letter to Trump, Morgan noted that given the president’s action to “overcome the difficulties to construction of both the Keystone XL and Dakota pipelines” and his desire to spend $1 trillion to improve the nation's infrastructure, “it strikes me that he might be willing to help Rhode Island with the stalled gas pipeline.”
“Over the past few winters as more homes have converted to gas
heat, National Grid and the Public Utilities Commission has been forced to
significantly increase the cost of electricity to ratepayers,” according to her
website press release. “Because homes heating needs are prioritized, they
consume the lion's share of our current capacity. The solution is building
another gas pipeline along the path of the existing pipeline to increase
capacity.”
However, the general trend across much of New England is that natural-gas prices are decreasing, largely
because of increased capacity and milder winters. Some of the reason for the
winter 2013-14 price spikes has been blamed on energy companies for not using
all of their storage resources.
Last month, National Grid filed a proposal with the Rhode Island
Public Utilities Commission that called for a decrease in the standard-offer
service rate for residential customers from 8.2 cents a kilowatt-hour to 6.8,
according to a Jan. 30 Providence Journal story.
In fact, according to the recent Providence Journal story, rates
for all of 2016 were generally low throughout New England. Mild weather and the
lowest natural-gas prices since 1999 drove overall wholesale energy prices to
their lowest point since 2003, Gordon van Welie, president and CEO of ISO-New
England, the operator of the regional power grid, told the newspaper.
Another Providence Journal story,
from October 2015, reported that National Grid expected the electric bill for
the typical residential customer to drop by as much as 8 percent.
In a Feb. 1 interview with ecoRI News, Morgan said the state’s
businesses and residents, especially her elderly constituents, need relief from
Rhode Island’s cost of living, which she noted was one of the highest in the
country. She also said Rhode Island is the “worst place to retire,” because of
these high costs.
According to Missouri Economic Research and
Information Center data from
the third quarter of 2016, Rhode Island ranked as the 11th highest place to
live, out of the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Massachusetts ranked
fourth and Connecticut seventh. Rounding out the six New England states was
Vermont at No. 10, New Hampshire at No. 12 and Maine at No. 14.
Morgan also told ecoRI News that Rhode Island has the
second-highest electric rate in the country. Rhode Island, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), is fourth, behind Hawaii,
Connecticut and Alaska, with an average retail price of 17.01 cents per
kilowatt-hour. Connecticut’s average retail price is 17.77 cents per
kilowatt-hour.
According to the EIA, Connecticut had the
highest residential average monthly electric bill in 2015, at $153.13, and was
the only New England state in the top 10.
Morgan noted that if a second pipeline was built it would lower
energy costs, improve Rhode Island’s business climate and create jobs for
construction workers. She said renewable-energy use is growing, but claimed
wind and solar are still more expensive than fossil fuels.
“We need inexpensive electric and gas to hear our homes,” she
said. “People are struggling to pay their bills. If electricity rates are
lower, that would help everyone and better people’s lives.”
Asked if she had concerns about climate-change impacts associated
with increased fossil-fuel use or with the dangers of hydraulic fracturing
(fracking), both Morgan and her policy analyst, Rachel Masciarelli, said no.
“After eight years of Obama, I’m sure we have put the proper
protections in place,” Morgan said.
They both said natural gas produces less emissions than coal or
oil, and that technology is making fracking safer. Masciarelli said there has
been only a handful of cases of aquifers being polluted by fracking. She also
noted that an additional pipeline in the smallest state wouldn’t make a
difference in the grand scheme of climate change.
Masciarelli e-mailed ecoRI News the research she
conducted regarding natural-gas production and fracking.
Morgan said climate change is real, but believes humans are
intelligent enough to overcome the potential impacts.
“Climate change is happening, but human beings are smart and we’ll
figure it out,” she said. “Mastodons in Rhode Island couldn’t adapt and died.
Humans can adapt.”
