THE GUARDIAN • December 29, 2021
Earlier this year, Massachusetts passed a landmark law as part of a push towards decarbonization that requires the state to cut emissions in half by 2030. But the state’s plan to meet this ambitious goal hit a snag this fall, when residents in Maine voted down a regional clean energy project, arguing it would irreversibly damage their own natural resources in order to deliver hydropower somewhere else. “This project was poorly designed from the beginning,” said Pete Didisheim of the Natural Resources Council of Maine (NRCM). “The developer failed almost every step of the way to involve the public and to provide Maine with meaningful benefits.”