The fight brewing over Gov. Healey’s energy affordability bill

DUE TO THE HOLIDAY, THE ARTICLE BELOW WAS NOT POSTED, BUT THERE IS A LENGTHY HISTORY OF ATTEMPTS TO SLASH ENERGY 

FUNDING & MANDATES. 


WORKING TOGETHER TO REDUCE DIRTY ENERGY CONSUMPTION REQUIRES ALL OF US! 


CHINA IS PROMOTING CHEAP CLEAN SOLAR & SELLING PACKAGES THAT INCLUDE BATTERY BACKUP, IDEAL FOR POORER NATIONS THAT NEED DEPENDABLE ELECTRICITY- THEIR ECONOMY IS PROSPERING. THEY ARE REDUCING THEIR CONSUMPTION & CLEANING UP THEIR ENVIRONMENT WE NEED TO DO THE SAME!





REP MARK CUSACK'S LEGISLATIVE HISTORY IS AVAILABLE HERE: 


REP. MARK J. CUSACK 
GENERAL COURT RECORD: 


The Download: Massachusetts EV charging plans continue to take hit
NOVEMBER 13, 2025

INCLUDES: 

CLIMATE: House members of a key legislative committee are forging ahead with a controversial bill that would defang the state’s 2030 emissions-reductions commitments. Jordan Wolman has the details.  


CLIMATE: A major bill that would weaken the state’s 2030 climate mandates is officially on the move in the House after seven House Democrats on the energy committee voted to advance it. It’s a sign of the political muscle being exerted on Beacon Hill to soften the state’s commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions – and is throwing Gov. Maura Healey’s energy affordability legislation into disarray. Jordan Wolman has more. 

MUST READ FOR LOTS OF FACTS & INFORMATION!

OPINION: Are the state’s ambitious 2030 climate commitments already out of reach? Rick Sullivan, a former state secretary of energy and environmental affairs and CEO of the Economic Development Council of Western Massachusetts, raises the question that’s reverberating around the State House right now.  



COMMONWEALTH BEACON POSTED HERE: 


The Download: Energy industry pads key lawmaker’s campaign coffers as major bill advances DON'T LET ENERGY INDUSTRY DICTATE POLICY!

NOVEMBER 14, 2025

COMMONWEALTH BEACON POSTED HERE:




House pivots on climate change and four more stories

NOVEMBER 15, 2025

POSTED HERE: 



House climate bill is a huge step backward MUST READ! 


        BELOW ARE 2 ARTICLES ADDRESSING THE PROPOSALS THAT WOULD 

        REDUCE/ELIMINATE CLEAN ENERGY LEGISLATION -- PLEASE READ TO 

        INFORM YOURSELVES & CONTACT YOUR ELECTED OFFICIALS TO                 OPPOSE THESE CHANGES DICTATED BY THE INDUSTRY! 

      

        I call your attention to these excerpts: 

Our lawmakers must be clear on what’s really driving high energy costs: it’s not clean energy. It’s fossil fuels, gas infrastructure, and aging transmission systems.  
In 2023 alone, Massachusetts consumers spent $20 billion on energy in their homes and businesses. Programs like Mass Save delivered over $34 billion in savings between 2012 and 2023 and generated more than $3 for every $1 invested. The program is the only tool we have that actively reduces energy burden for all of us, including low- and moderate-income households that are hardest hit by rising energy costs. 
Mass Save has weatherized 350,000 homes (including 70,000 low-income homes), created nearly 76,000 jobs, and saved the equivalent output of five power plants. Even if you’ve never used it directly, you’ve benefited from lower wholesale energy prices because your neighbors did. These are real savings in people’s wallets.  

Only a year earlier, when the region’s peak electricity demand reached 18,300 megawatts on January 17, 2024, emissions averaged about 85 metric tons per minute most of the day. Why? Because natural gas was available. In a single year, a 10 percent increase in electricity usage drove up emissions by 60 percent.  

With ratepayer-funded rebates encouraging installation of up to 500,000 heat pumps—which cost between $20,000 to $30,000 apiece—adding stress to our already overburdened electricity grid, the problem will only get worse and more expensive.  

As bad as this all sounds—and it is bad—Gov. Healey is smart to leave all options on the table.     


POSTED HERE: 

MIDDLEBORO REVIEW AND SO ON        



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Note: We will be off tomorrow for Veterans Day but will be back in your inbox on Wednesday.

HOLYOKE: There’s a tale of two middle schools in Holyoke. Half of the city's middle-schoolers are enjoying a brand-new facility, and the other half continue to learn in a 64-year-old building, underlining the strain that communities can face from Proposition 2½ limits and an inequitable state funding formula. Hallie Claflin has more. 

RISING SEAS: State environmental officials want to move forward with a voluntary buyout program for residential properties that face the greatest risks from sea-level rise. Jordan Wolman reports on the new strategy. 

MARIJUANA: State cannabis regulators could vote by Christmas on regulations for social consumption sites, or “pot cafes,” a feature of the 2016 voter law legalizing recreational cannabis that has yet to materialize. Michael P. Norton and Sam Drysdale have more for State House News Service. 

OPINION: TransitMatters’s Will Palmer and Elias Fen and former transportation secretary James Aloisi contend that now is the time for the MBTA and state officials to commit to the Red-Blue Connector, which would join the only two subway lines that today do not connect.  

Any Democrat in Massachusetts eyeing ways to slow down the state’s ambitious commitments to move away from planet-warming fossil fuels knows they’re asking for trouble with environmental advocates.  

That’s exactly what’s already playing out as a key member of the House prepares to advance a plan to ease 2030 climate targets and cut the budget for the state’s energy efficiency program.   

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Rep. Mark Cusack, co-chair of the Joint Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities, and Energy, told CommonWealth Beacon that he is planning to use Gov. Maura Healey’s energy affordability bill filed earlier this year as a vehicle to achieve those policy points and others. He is aiming for his redraft of Healey’s legislation to receive a floor vote before lawmakers break for the year on November 19.   

Cue the outrage.  

“We will fill the State House,” said Larry Chretien, executive director at Green Energy Consumers Alliance. “This is going to be one of the bigger deals for the environmental community in a long time. We’re going to give it everything.”  

The effort is bound to divide the Democratic supermajority on Beacon Hill and test officials’ willingness to defend the state’s climate policies just as winter hits and Healey mounts a reelection bid.   

Cusack is arguing that because of a seismic crackdown on clean energy from the Trump administration, the state is likely to miss its goal to halve its emissions by 2030 compared to 1990 levels. Keeping those short-term commitments on the books, then, is political and legal malpractice, he said, opening the state up to legal challenges.  

Plus, fury over sky-high energy bills last winter proved to Beacon Hill that officials need to do everything in their power to lower gas and electric costs, Cusack said. Those factors triggered Healey’s energy package, which aims to save ratepayers $10 billion over a decade, and pushed the state into “all-of-the-above” energy mode as the White House works to choke off new offshore wind and solar power.   

“We’re looking at the real possibility here, in the objective analysis, that we are not going to make our greenhouse reduction mandates,” Cusack said. “I have not found anyone who says that we are going to make our mandates.”   

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But Chretien, who successfully sued the state a decade ago along with other groups for Massachusetts’s failure to do more to combat climate change, said Cusack’s concern over litigation is a “boogeyman.”  

“At this point, we want Massachusetts to give its best effort,” he said. “We’ve got five years to go to move the needle on emissions. It’s way too early to think about that. I’m just looking for effort. We understand what the Trump administration is doing to climate policy and that makes it harder. So talk to me seven years from now.” 

CLIMATE DEBATE: The point person on energy policy in the House is planning to use Gov. Maura Healey’s pending energy affordability legislation as a vehicle to pull back on the state’s ambitious climate goals. Jordan Wolman has more. 

UNION BUYOUTS: The Healey administration has approached at least four unions representing public-sector employees about a potential buyout program – the latest flashpoint in a debate about using state funds amid delays to food aid and cuts to child care programs – which could affect more than 2,000 state workers, Chris Lisinski reports. 

SHUTDOWN: Several US Senate Democrats broke ranks and voted with Republicans on a deal that moves toward ending the federal government shutdown, quickly drawing blowback from others on the left who view the move as failing to extract enough concessions. (CNN) 

SNAP: Distribution of food aid to more than 1 million Bay Staters continues to be wracked with chaos. Massachusetts began paying full benefits late last week, but then the US Supreme Court paused a lower court order and the Trump administration called on states to “undo” payments. (NBC Boston) 

STUDENTS: Some public colleges and universities in Massachusetts blamed the Trump administration’s travel and visa restrictions for declining international student enrollment. (WBUR) 

LOGAN: The first day of reduced air traffic, another government shutdown impact, created long lines and stranded passengers at Logan International Airport. (GBH News) 

SPRINGFIELD: The arrest of Healey aide LaMar Cook on firearms and drug trafficking charges has rattled residents in Springfield, who say they considered him a pillar of the community and a role model. (The Boston Globe – paywall)  

 
 
 
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