The State of Connecticut recently reinforced the use of renewable energy and a “cleaner” electrical grid in the middle of Trump administration policies designed to stop climate projects. The move is part of a 10+ year Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) initiative to assess the state’s growing electricity needs in cooperation with the other New England states.
“DEEP is required periodically to review the state’s energy and capacity resource assessment…[to] maximize consumer benefits consistent with the state’s environmental goals and standards,” their Integrated Resources Plan notice states.
The plan will guide the state’s procurement of energy resources, such as conventional and renewable generating facilities, distributed generation and “emerging energy technologies,” among others.
Although DEEP’s planning process started in February, Connecticut has had to navigate top-down blows to energy projects from Trump-approved policies, like a stop-work order for the offshore Revolution Wind farm, which is set to provide renewable energy to Connecticut and Rhode Island.
Connecticut, alongside other states, have ongoing legal proceedings to try and get Revolution Wind back online, suggesting that the stop-work order was baseless since it “did not identify any violation of law or imminent threat to safety [and] abstractly cites BOEM’s authority…so that the agency may address unidentified ‘concerns.'”
On the same note, a new team-up between Connecticut and Maine hopes to beat a ticking clock by building renewable projects faster, in order to make use of federal tax programs before they expire. Trump’s new policy, part of the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” requires wind and solar farms to begin construction before July 2026 (and-or placed into service by the end of 2027) to qualify for the tax credits.
“By participating in Connecticut’s latest procurement effort, the state can consider its options to deliver more cost-effective clean power within federal tax credit timelines,” Dan Burgess, acting commissioner of the Maine Department of Energy Resources, told Maine Public Radio.
The two states will “share notes” on energy proposals, independently evaluating and deciding whether proposals will benefit their infrastructure and citizens. It’s a natural pairing, since all six New England states share an electrical grid.
“Overall, New England’s grid and Connecticut’s distribution system are in good shape,” a recent Regional Plan Association report states. “Over the last fifty years, New England utility companies and transmission owners have consistently upgraded their equipment, replacing old infrastructure with newer, more reliable infrastructure.”
Due to the infrastructure sharing, most electrical projects cross state lines; Renewable energy sources currently only account for 8% of the whole of New England’s energy resource mix, according to RPA, with the most coming from natural gas and nuclear production.
Connecticut has lofty goals, though, including generating 40% of its electricity from renewable sources by 2030 and 100% by 2040 according to the state’s 2024 Clean and Renewable Energy Report. Maine has similar goals.
The timeline to renewable energy adoption was temporarily slowed by installation delays of a hydropower transmission line from Canada to feed into the New England grid in Maine, which is now expected to be complete within months, if the federal government doesn’t halt it.
DEEP’s Integrated Resources Plan process is ongoing, in an effort to determine a variety of results affecting stakeholders across the state.
“The [Integrated Resources Plan] will consider a range of potential energy supply policy cases to meet Connecticut’s anticipated electricity needs reliably over the next three, five, and ten years,” DEEP’s notice states. “Such cases will consider potential state and/or multistate-regional investments in new energy resources needed to address gaps in the ISO New England markets or otherwise ensure electric affordability and reliability and achievement of state policy targets and goals.”
DEEP also “requests written comments from the public regarding the scope of this next IRP as an initial part of its stakeholder engagement process,” with information available on its agency webpage at portal.ct.gov/deep/energy.