Brian Willis, Brian.Willis@sierraclub.org
NEW YORK - Today, the Trump-appointed, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) expanded its disastrous energy pricing scheme into New York’s electricity market, a move that will drive up costs and undermine the state’s nationally recognized Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act. FERC’s rule expansion, known as the Buyer Side Mitigation Rule, mirrors the Minimum Price Offer Rule (MOPR), which will affect multiple states in PJM, the nation’s largest power grid that stretches from the Mid-Atlantic to the Midwest. Both rules will punish local clean energy resources like solar, wind, and storage by forcing new clean energy to pay a premium to enter the lucrative capacity markets that ensure power is available at times of high demand, sabotaging the state’s incentives to combat fossil fuel pollution and the climate crisis.
The FERC’s plans to manipulate energy pricing has been widely panned by energy lawyers, policy experts, utilities, and government officials as a federal backdoor bailout of uneconomic coal and gas plants, which are facing increased competition from cleaner cheaper competitors like wind and solar.
In response, Mary Anne Hitt, Senior Director of Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign, released the following statement:
“By expanding FERC’s brazenly anti-clean energy rule into New York, the Trump Administration is attempting to expand its backdoor bailout of failing fossil fuel plants, and it’s an outrage. This ruling shows how this once usually impartial commission has been reduced to meddling in a state’s right to establish clean energy goals that protect public health and ensure electricity customers aren’t subjected to predatory pricing. FERC’s plans will not only increase electricity costs and climate pollution, but will also undermine access to clean energy that New Yorkers have clearly demanded. We stand firmly against the commission’s decision and will challenge it moving forward.”
About the Sierra Club
The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with more than 3.5 million members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person's right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org.