Mass. House unveils bill to streamline clean energy infrastructure construction

House Democrats will bring forward a late-session clean energy reform bill for a vote Wednesday, pushing another major measure closer to Gov. Maura Healey’s desk.

The House Ways and Means Committee on Tuesday began moving a 97-page redraft of Senate-approved legislation that would streamline how Massachusetts decides where to build clean energy infrastructure.

Top House Democrats appear poised to go beyond the siting reforms and pursue a major new authorization for clean energy procurement that did not feature in the Senate bill, while leaving untouched some Senate-backed ideas like an update to the state’s bottle deposit law.

A spokesperson for House Speaker Ron Mariano confirmed the House will take up the bill in a formal session scheduled for Wednesday. If it wins approval as expected, House and Senate Democrats would have two weeks of formal business left to iron out a compromise.

“In an effort to meet our long-term emission reduction goals, the House will vote this week on legislation aimed at increasing our supply of clean energy by setting new renewable energy generation and storage procurement targets and streamlining the state and local permitting process, building on the work that the Legislature has done in recent years to modernize the Commonwealth’s energy grid and to combat the climate crisis,” Mariano said in a statement.

Utilities, energy generators and regulators largely agree that the existing process for siting and permitting new clean energy infrastructure is too complex and slow, especially as Massachusetts works to overhaul the grid to accommodate the clean energy resources needed to meet net-zero emissions targets by 2050.