Maryland and Maine seek to increase energy storage development

As part of 181 laws that Moore signed into law on 20 May, the two mentioned bills were the Next Generation Energy Act and the Renewable Energy Certainty Act.

The Next Generation Energy Act seeks to boost local power generation and battery energy storage, while also reducing costs for consumers by restricting utility spending of ratepayer funds.

This act was sponsored by Maryland state senator Brian J. Feldman and first read into the record in February.

The Next Generation Energy Act “alters the factors the public service commission (PSC) must consider before taking final action on a certificate of public convenience and necessity; establishes a distributed generation certificate of public convenience and necessity to authorise the construction and operation of a certain distributed solar energy generating system.”

Notably, the bill directs the PSC to procure 800MW of energy storage capacity. The PSC must decide whether to approve one or more proposals by 1 October 2026.

Energy storage projects will also retain any energy and ancillary services revenue earned.

The bill also requires the Power Plant Research Program to submit siting and design requirements to the PSC by 1 July, 2026.

Local advocacy group Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN) wrote about the bill, praising it for lowering energy bills and slowing gas infrastructure expansion.

CCAN also wrote that “The finalised Next Generation Energy Act gives new gas next to nothing while giving battery storage specific, time-bound financial support. This guarantees that battery storage will be the near-term focus as Maryland continues its path toward a clean energy future.”

The Renewable Energy Certainty Act, sponsored by state delegates C. T. Wilson and Brian M. Crosby, also first read into the record in February, is cross-filed with the Next Generation Energy Act.

This legislation establishes consistent siting guidelines for commercial solar farms in Maryland, occasionally superseding local authorities that aimed to limit the farms through zoning regulations.

Furthermore, the bills will allocate around US$200 million from a state fund designed for collecting payments from electricity suppliers that fail to meet Maryland’s renewable energy requirements, redirecting this amount to ratepayers. This will average approximately US$80 per household.

In other words, these bills together create an easier pathway for energy storage, wind and solar development while attempting to keep costs down for customers.

This decision comes just weeks before Baltimore Gas and Electric’s customers’ prices are expected to increase by approximately US$16 per month.

While the US$80 payments split into two payments of US$40 will not cover half of the rate increase over a year, it is still an effort to alleviate some of the extra costs being placed on customers.

Governor Moore vetoed two other bills focused on energy storage planning.

The Energy Resource Adequacy and Planning Act, which sought to create an energy planning office to provide reports on the power system, was vetoed. Moore said such an office would be redundant and inefficient.

The Data Centre Impact Analysis and Report, which aimed to conduct studies on the environmental and grid impacts of data centres within Maryland, was also vetoed.

A similar data centre bill was vetoed by Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin earlier this month.

In April 2023, Maryland legislators approved a bill requiring the deployment of at least 3GW of energy storage in the state by 2033.

Maine Public Utilities Commission issues request for comment from energy storage developers

In related news, from another state looking to advance energy storage development, the Maine Public Utilities Commission (MPUC) has issued a request for comment from energy storage developers by 9 June.

The open inquiry and request for comment are to support a 200MW procurement of transmission-level energy storage projects in the state.

Maine has set statutory targets for energy storage capacity at 300 MW by 2025 and 400 MW by 2030.

400MW represents approximately 20% of Maine’s peak demand in 2021. The 400MW goal is large relative to the state’s demand.

In 2023, the Maine Governor’s Energy Office (GEO) was tasked with evaluating and recommending designs for a cost-effective procurement of 200MW of energy storage. The MPUC was instructed to assess whether the program would aid in meeting the statutory targets.

GEO has submitted the recommendations to the MPUC, which encouraged a procurement and separate requests for proposals (RFPs) for transmission-level and distribution-level energy storage projects.

The MPUC is first conducting an RFP for transmission-level projects and has issued this request for comment to develop the RFP.

Law firm Foley Hoag LLP explained that the request for comment addresses eight categories:

1. ISO-NE Interconnection-Related Realities – Commenters should explain the impact of current backlog, cluster-study timing, and FERC Order 2023 reforms on project viability, costs, and timelines for storage development.
2. Market Externalities and Federal Credits – Commenters should explain how tariffs and federal tax credits might affect future bids. The GEO recommended bidders indicate expected tax credits during the bidding process.
3. Realistic Commercial Operation Dates – Commenters must predict commercial operation dates based on a procurement award date of 1 January, 2026, and clarify how storage technology, project size, and location may affect this timeline.
4. Ratepayer Benefits – Commenters should provide information on ratepayer benefits (e.g., peak shaving, deferral of transmission upgrades) and how to monetise or incentivise those benefits.
5. Evaluation Framework for Benefits – Commenters are invited to propose an evaluation method for ratepayer benefits that includes (a) geographic value, (b) grid reliability contribution, (c) contract performance during peak hours, (d) avoided transmission/distribution costs and (e) other benefits from a transmission-level storage project.
6. Prescriptive vs. Open-Ended Incentive Structures – The MPUC invites comments on whether the RFP should be “prescriptive with respect to incentives or whether a bidder should propose their won incentive structure.”
7. Lessons from Neighboring States – Commenters can discuss other northeastern states’ storage procurement programs and their possible relevance to Maine.
8. Commercially Available Technologies – The MPUC requests that commenters identify the storage technologies deemed commercially available and discuss if the RFP should enforce a specific technology list (such as lithium-ion, iron air, flow batteries, etc.).  

Securing energy storage will further advance the state’s objective of attaining 100% clean electricity by 2040. Maine has successfully cut greenhouse gas emissions by 30% and is close to achieving its target of a 45% reduction by 2030.