Lawmakers have sent Gov. Mikie Sherrill eight measures designed to improve the energy supply and prevent ratepayer cost spikes like the 20% one that hit a year ago.
Energy policy was prominent during Senate and Assembly voting sessions alongside a $60.7 billion budget and $360 million in supplemental spending, much on local projects. Two-thirds of the 12 energy bills they considered made it to Sherrill's desk for her consideration.
Sherrill, a Democrat in her first term, made energy a campaign centerpiece last year, after New Jersey families endured the highest average electricity bill increase of any state in the nation.
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At her inauguration in January, she signed two executive orders declaring an energy emergency and calling for a freeze in electricity rates this year.
In April, Sherrill signed legislation to allow for nuclear energy development, which backers say will broaden the supply and bring down costs.
The Garden State Balcony Solar Act, which cleared both houses, could give residents the ability to lower electricity bills on their own: allowing anyone, including renters with a balcony, to plug solar panels into wall outlets to replace some utility-delivered power. Such systems are popular in parts of Europe, and at least six states this year passed laws to permit them.
About eight in 10 registered voters were supportive of balcony solar, according to a Fairleigh Dickinson University poll in April.
"Generating clean energy at home is the fastest and most reliable way to protect NJ families from rising energy costs," said Elowyn Corby, senior regional director of the nonprofit Vote Solar Action Fund.
The energy bills on the governor’s desk include:
- S-1673 would require transmission facilities to join PJM Interconnection, the regional grid manager that includes New Jersey and all or part of a dozen other states. The bill could save ratepayers $60 million annually, according to Evergreen Action.
- A-5188 would require state oversight of automation, storage, inverter and other supplemental transmission projects, and expedite their review.
- S-3939 would allow dual-use solar energy projects installed on farmland to participate in the Community Solar Energy Program for utility bill credits.
- S-3183 would modify renewable incentive programs, require electric public utilities to interconnect certain solar projects and halve the 20-acre acreage threshold for renewable facilities located in municipal industrial zones.
- A-4881, called the Power NJ Act, would direct the state Board of Public Utilities to work with the New Jersey Economic Development Authority to establish a program to procure, evaluate and approve advanced nuclear energy facilities.
"With both rising costs and increased demand for electricity, New Jersey needs to explore all manners of increasing our production capacity without contributing to climate change through new fossil fuel-burning facilities," said Sen. Bob Smith (D-Middlesex), one of the bill's sponsors. "Properly regulated nuclear power is reliable, safe and most importantly does not emit greenhouse gases."
