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Massachusetts Clean Energy Bill Testimony

Testimony of Jonathan L. Campbell
Environmental Consultant
1 Minot Ave., Littleton, MA 01460

June 26, 1997

Dear Honorable Committee Members,

I come to you today to give testimony in favor of H. 4415, the Clean Energy Bill. As a result of electric utility deregulation, there have been several proposals made regarding energy policy in the Commonwealth. It is extremely important to view these proposals in terms of their environmental and economic impact on the Commonwealth and its citizens.

Twenty years ago, our nation embarked on a program of energy efficiency and development of renewable energy resources as an answer to the oil embargo and dwindling oil resources worldwide. Unfortunately, this program was all but canceled by subsequent administrations in Washington. However, the data and conclusions that led to the emergence of that program still hold today.

Electrical energy efficiency is the cheapest and cleanest source of "new" electric capacity. In other words, every kilowatt-hour saved by individual homeowners and businesses through more efficient use of electrical power is a "new" source of electricity. The investment for electrical efficiency is far cheaper than investment in a new power plant, per kilowatt-hour. Examples abound, such as conversion of standard incandescent lighting to quartz-iodine lamps, and switching from inefficient and ghastly expensive electric heat to gas. (Electrical heating is incredibly inefficient, since the customer only receives 1/3 of the power: 2/3 is lost at the electric plant and the transmission lines. Three times as much fuel is burned for the same heat!).

Co-generation (production of heat and electricity by the same energy plant) at existing industrial facilities is the second cheapest source of new electricity capacity. If incentives were given to companies to replace their standard heating plants with ones that produce electricity at the same time as they produce heat, then those companies would then become a huge source of new electrical capacity, with little environmental impact.

Renewable energy sources, such as hydroelectric, photovoltaic cells (30-100 times as efficient as the cells available 20 years ago), and natural/artificial ponds for summer cooling (thus dramatically reducing air conditioning load), are the third cheapest source of new electrical capacity. For obvious reasons, the environmental impact of renewable sources is usually extremely minimal. (For the record, municipal trash incineration is not a renewable energy source. More on this later in my testimony.)

The most costly source of new energy capacity, and certainly the most environmentally damaging, is a new fossil-fueled power plant.

That said, I believe that H. 4415 is the best of the energy proposals presented thus far, because it promotes minimum standards for energy efficiency and investment in renewable sources. By instituting electric source disclosure, it promotes accountability on the part of the electric utilities. By enforcing compliance with the Clean Air Act on electric suppliers, it levels the playing field for investment in electrical energy efficiency, co-generation, and renewable sources as compared with the older, dirtier power plants of the Midwest. (I should think that it would not be our intention to promote electrical imports from the latter plants, whose pollution plume reaches throughout the Commonwealth.)

Finally, I think it is important to say something about incineration, which is being touted in Governor Weld’s energy proposal as a "renewable" energy source. Municipal "waste-to-energy" technology is a misnomer: it is a mechanism by which vast quantities of reusable, recyclable materials are destroyed and converted into millions of tons of toxic ash, while polluting the countryside with the most toxic organic chemical substance known: dioxin. In 1994, the US EPA published its draft Dioxin Reassessment, in which the agency stated that incinerators were by far the largest source of dioxin emissions in the U.S. The result has been that the entire top of our food chain – meat and fish – have become contaminated with this super-toxin, and adverse impacts on our health are already measurable.

The waste-to-energy incinerators operating in the Commonwealth are some of the largest sources of dioxin and mercury pollution in the Commonwealth. If anything, we should be promoting comprehensive recycling and re-use and shutting down these polluting machines, not promoting them as sources of electricity.

Notably, H 4415 excludes incineration as a "renewable" energy resource.

I urge you to support H. 4415 and to oppose any legislation that promotes incineration as a source of new electric generating capacity.