Stopping Northern Pass made you more dependent on the price of natural gas.
That would be a market line... and not a government required upgrade that could be recouped by transmission rates.
Quebec, and Eversource - since they were the only ones large enough to handle the build out of the transmission line all the way to a point in the grid that could handle that level of generation - gave you an out to at least a partial offset of the current increase in the actual cost of electricity that is based on market fundamentals. You chose no. Now you get to live with the choice you made. It was a collective choice... but one we may live to regret.
It also meant that we now have to pay more for the transmission upgrade to the Coos loop. That will allow the biomass plant in Berlin to run at full output even when other generation sources (wind/solar/smaller hydro) are seeing high output.
Everything except conservation and downsizing has offsets.
Also the arguments made by the opposition are going to have increased costs in the infrastructure going forward that will be significant. No neighborhood near an existing generator now feels that when transmission lines are to be replaced that they should be above ground in large overhead towers.
But it could go even further down... Laconia has a tower on the Eversource public launch site that runs to a tower at Opechee Point, and then to a tower on the North Main street side. What if Eversource had to place that one under the lake and charge it to all the customers... even those not next to Lake Opechee? Instances like this happen all around the State. So we could be looking at a much more costly line charge as we go forward over the next several years.
What a company pays its workers is up to a mix of the market demand/labor supply and what the investors/board are willing to forgo in return on their investment for that labor.
Whenever you invest in something, there are costs... you determine if those costs are valid in relation to your ROI.
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