PIPELINE TEST — POLITICO’s Marie J. French: Gov. Kathy Hochul faces a major decision on a new pipeline supported by President Donald Trump to bring more natural gas into the New York City region.
The Department of Environmental Conservation declared the application for a water quality permit for the Northeast Supply Enhancement Project complete on Wednesday. The pipeline would run 24 miles from New Jersey, across the Raritan Bay, to connect to the pipeline system in the Rockaways.
The state told federal agencies last month it would make a decision on the project by Nov. 30, in compliance with an accelerated timeline under a Trump executive order. The DEC declined to schedule any public hearings at this stage, a move sure to spark pushback from environmental advocates.
— National Grid filed an updated long-term gas plan Wednesday, highlighting reliability and cost savings for customers if NESE is built.
“National Grid is committed to fulfilling our responsibility to provide safe, reliable, and affordable energy to our customers," said Sally Librera, president of National Grid New York. "This addendum to our Gas System Long-Term Plan outlines critical investments necessary to ensure our gas network continues to operate dependably and supports the region’s growing energy needs."
— NEW JERSEY LEG: The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection said it has received land use and air permit applications from Transcontinental Gas Pipeline Co. for the portion of its proposed Northeast Supply Enhancement pipeline in the Garden State. A DEP spokesperson said most of the permits have a 120-day total permit review window but a Freshwater Wetlands permit does not have a statutory deadline.
Several New Jersey towns have passed resolutions opposing the project, according to the Sierra Club, which also opposes it. — Ry Rivard
PORTAL NORTH — Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) toured the Portal North Bridge project on Wednesday morning along with top officials from NJ Transit and Amtrak. The bridge, which is part of the larger Gateway program and sits between Jersey City and Newark, will replace an old bridge over the Hackensack River that creates a chokepoint for trains moving around New Jersey and in and out of New York City.
After a bruising fight over the megabill this week that Booker strongly opposes, he sounded a bipartisan note about the bridge. President Donald Trump green-lit the bridge during his first administration after lobbying from Gov. Phil Murphy and it’s since gotten billions of dollars in federal money.
“I didn’t stop and ask one hardhat whether they voted for me or not, whether they voted for which party or not,” Booker said following a tour of the construction site. “This is about Americans working together to get great things done, to build projects that serve all of America.”
The bridge is expected to be finished in fall 2027 with one track in service in 2026. — Ry Rivard
DEP MULLS COASTAL RULES CHANGE — POLITICO’s Ry Rivard: The Murphy administration is reconsidering parts of the sprawling package of coastal building rules meant to cope with rising sea levels.
It’s unclear what amendments the Department of Environmental Protection might make, but Commissioner Shawn LaTourette has publicly shown he’s open to changes. At a recent public event, he said he was “not allergic” to amendments. Lobbyists on both sides of the issue are now expecting a new draft of the rules.
One of the biggest flashpoints is the assumed amount of sea level rise that developers should prepare for. The original draft rule assumes, using scientists’ projections, that sea levels will rise by 5 feet by the end of the century — a major threat to development and tourism along the state’s 130 miles or so of coastline.
That concerns environmental groups supporting the rule, including the state chapter of the Sierra Club and the New Jersey League of Conservation Voters. Advocates from both groups are worried that revising the rule could delay its final adoption. Gov. Phil Murphy is term-limited and leaves office in January. “We are concerned because the clock is ticking,” said Anjuli Ramos-Busot, the state Sierra Club director.
Ray Cantor, a representative of the Business and Industry Association, has helped organize opposition to the rule package, including a plane that flew over the Jersey Shore last summer carrying a sign that warned about the rule. He’s also waiting to see what the DEP does. “Until we know what they are going to do, our concerns remain,” he said.
PORTAL NORTH SETTLEMENT — NJ Transit paid $450,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by a former engineer who alleged he was fired for raising concerns about the design of the Portal North bridge, the most expensive project in the transit agency’s history. Mohammed Nasin, who was the chief of construction management for the rail bridge, alleged in an early 2024 lawsuit that he’d found design defects, including track settlement issues.
The settlement happened earlier this year, on Jan. 22, but was below the threshold that requires NJ Transit board approval. It was, however, disclosed to lawmakers in May after Sen. Michael Testa, a Cumberland County Republican, asked about the litigation during back and forths over the budget. In a written response to Testa, NJ Transit revealed the settlement. The agency said Portal North is “on time and on budget, with Amtrak scheduled to take over construction of track, catenary and other systems in the coming months. The bridge project is scheduled to be completed in the fall of 2027. The Portal Bridge project has an excellent safety record.”
John Chartier, an NJ Transit spokesperson, said in an email to POLITICO that the $450,000 included back pay and attorneys’ fees. “There was no admission of liability by NJ Transit and there was a confidentiality clause in the settlement,” he said.
An attorney for Nasim, Paula Dillon, declined to comment. — Ry Rivard
RATE HIKE PROPOSED — POLITICO’s Marie J. French: Two major upstate gas and electric utilities owned by Avangrid want to raise customer bills more than 20 percent.
New York State Electric and Gas and Rochester Gas and Electric filed their rate proposals on Monday, arguing they need to recover costs for storm recovery, unpaid bills and compliance with new in-state call center requirements.
NYSEG serves nearly 1 million electricity customers and 270,000 gas customers. RG&E serves 386,000 electricity customers and 320,000 natural gas customers. The two companies are owned by Avangrid, whose parent company is Spanish energy giant Iberdrola.
Utility rate hikes have become a political flashpoint as affordability remains top of mind for policymakers in New York. Gov. Kathy Hochul criticized the rate increase proposals.
The two utilities “must find a way to avoid these unacceptably high rate hikes,” she said in a statement. “I am calling on the Department of Public Service to scrutinize these proposals to ensure these companies have the resources to keep our energy grid going but are not making additional profit off the backs of ratepayers.”
BUDGET BASH — A pair of New Jersey Senate Democrats offered modest criticism of the state budget’s diversion of $190 million from the Board of Public Utilities’ clean energy fund to prop up NJ Transit and the state budget surplus.
Sen. Andrew Zwicker gave a brief floor speech about the diversion before his chamber approved the $58.8 billion budget deal on Monday afternoon, which Gov. Phil Murphy signed late Monday night. Zwicker said he understood the move but that the state needs to use the clean energy money to help get clean air, clean water and better energy prices.
“It is critically important that we make those investments moving forward,” Zwicker said.
In an interview, Sen. Bob Smith, who chairs the Senate’s energy committee, said there is a “tenuous connection” between clean energy funding and NJ Transit, since getting cars off the road is good for the environment.
But that connection, Smith said, is “not as strong as building new energy storage or building windmills or making our grid more flexible.”
The senators were not alone or loudest to lament term-limited Murphy’s final budget. Environmental groups also criticized the clean energy fund transfers, and both the attorney general and state comptroller, two members of Murphy’s own Cabinet, slammed other non-environmental aspects of the budget.
At a BPU meeting on Monday afternoon, none of the four members ventured to justify the money being taken from their budget, but they also did not criticize it.
“This budget is reflecting an additional diversion from the clean energy fund, but it is not reflecting a cutting of programs,” board President Christine Guhl-Sadovy said in the entity’s sole remark about the budget deal. — Ry Rivard
A BRIGHT SPOT — Both chambers have passed a bill to ease permitting of solar projects (S4100/A5264). “We should put people over paperwork so we can get more solar on our rooftops and more savings for ratepayers in our wallets — that’s a win for our environment, our electric grid and for all of us,” Sen. John McKeon, a Democrat, said in a statement.
Smith also said that both houses have passed legislation to provide $60 million to help with battery storage projects. That bill comes after a recently-approved BPU battery storage program that is funded with $125 million in money from the settlement with Orsted, the energy company that canceled a pair of offshore wind farms in the state. — Ry Rivard |
