A lifeline has been extended to New England’s Everett LNG import terminal. Terminal operator, Constellation Energy, has reached supply agreements with northeast utilities Eversource and National Grid to keep the terminal operating for another six years. Located in Boston Harbor, the terminal was facing shuttering its operations as a result of the pending closure of the terminal’s number one demand source, Constellation’s Mystic Generating Station. The company plans to retire the 1,413-MW natural gas fired combined-cycle power plant later this year.
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Cold As Ice - Pending Closure of Everett LNG Terminal Poses Challenge for New England Gas Supply
The Everett LNG import terminal, a mainstay of Boston’s gas grid, is expected to close by the end of May 2024, raising questions about future gas supply in New England. The terminal’s closure is closely tied to the imminent loss of its biggest customer, the 1,413-MW Mystic generating station — the region’s largest fossil-fuel plant. Constellation Energy, which owns both the Everett terminal and the Mystic power plant, has said it can’t keep Everett open next year when the Mystic plant closes unless another gas purchaser takes its place. In today’s RBN blog, we’ll address the impacts of Everett’s potential demise on New England in the short term and on regional gas supply during future polar vortex events.
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Hello, Goodbye - New England Hopes New Life for Everett LNG Will Help Ease Reliability Concerns, Despite Mystic's Closure
The 1,413-MW Mystic Generating Station, a longtime workhorse for New England, shut its doors for good May 31. Located in Charlestown, MA, on the north side of Boston, Mystic is adjacent to the Everett LNG terminal, which supplied 100% of Mystic’s natural gas for several decades. The power plant’s closure meant the Everett terminal might also be history. However, the Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities (DPU) recently approved new contracts that will keep Everett LNG open for at least six more years. In today’s RBN blog, we’ll discuss the combined impact of Mystic’s demise and Everett’s stay of execution, how the region has handled this summer’s heat wave, and what could be in store for next winter.
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I'm Moving On - Is New England's On-and-Off Embrace of Gas-Fired Power Headed for a Fall?
The U.S. power sector’s shift to natural gas over the past few years has been a boon to gas producers across the Lower 48, especially in the Northeast. Scores of new gas-fired power plants have been built there during the Shale Era, and a number of coal-fired, oil-fired, and nuclear plants have been taken offline. New England is a case in point; gas-fired power now accounts for about half of the installed generating capacity in the six-state region (Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine) — three times what it was 20 years ago. But New Englanders have a love-hate relationship with natural gas, and with renewables and energy storage on the rise, gas’s role in the land of the Red Sox, hard-to-understand accents, and lobsta’ rolls may well have peaked. Today, we discuss recent developments on the natural gas and power generation fronts in the northeastern corner of the U.S.
