Six Reasons Why New Gas Pipelines are the Wrong Choice for Maine

There’s an old saying that if you’re in a hole, you should stop digging. So, why would we consider building new gas pipelines when Maine’s dependence on imported fossil fuels is the primary reason for our high electricity prices?

Maine is part of the New England regional electric grid, which is overly reliant on imported natural gas (because natural gas is almost entirely methane, we will refer to it as methane gas from now on). Maine’s overdependence on methane gas causes two major problems for our communities and businesses:

• Spikes in gasoline, diesel, and heating oil prices due to the war in Iran are already squeezing Maine families and businesses. On top of that, the cost of imported methane gas for power generation is the primary driver of high electricity costs in Maine. We won’t reduce electricity prices, or energy prices in general, without freeing ourselves from fossil fuels.
• From warming waters to destructive storms and sea-level rise, climate change is threatening the health of our communities and the industries that rely on a clean, healthy environment. Burning methane gas creates the pollution that causes climate change. Worse, when methane gas leaks unburned, it is a climate super-polluter, with more than 80 times the warming power of carbon dioxide. So, our dependence on methane gas is making climate change worse for all of us.

There’s an obvious solution: Build new sources of homegrown clean energy, like Maine-based wind and solar, to diversify our energy mix and eliminate our reliance on expensive imported fuels. Maine businesses, towns, residents, and community groups have made a lot of progress in advancing homegrown clean energy solutions to save money and become more energy independent.

Despite the answer being in front of our noses, there is a determined chorus arguing that Maine should instead support doubling down on our dependence on methane gas by building new gas pipelines into New England or expanding existing ones.

Here are six reasons why new gas pipelines are the wrong direction for Maine:

1. Natural gas isn’t the solution to high electricity prices — it’s the problem.

We can’t emphasize this enough: dependence on methane gas for electricity is the primary driver of high electricity costs in Maine, which is part of the New England regional electricity market.

Electric bills went up by an average of $11-$16/month at the beginning of 2026 because of higher methane gas prices. Because of how the New England electricity market works, methane-fueled power plants set the price of electricity for the whole market nearly all the time, and when those costs go up, we all pay the price.

The regional grid operator ISO New England in its annual market report explained that wholesale energy costs in the region increased by 77% or $4.3 billion in 2025, saying, “Higher energy costs were largely attributable to natural gas prices, which increased by 105%.”

2. Building new pipelines will make us more dependent on imported gas, worsening price risks.

Because our electricity costs are tied to methane gas costs, doubling down on gas only makes Maine families and businesses more exposed to the risk inherent in fossil fuel markets.

Proponents argue that there is lots of cheap methane gas waiting in the fracking fields of Pennsylvania. While regional hub pricing data doesn’t always back that claim up, this argument also ignores the reality that the Trump Administration is pushing forward billions of dollars in projects to export methane gas as liquified natural gas (or LNG). Shipping LNG overseas competes with domestic uses, pushing prices in the U.S. higher.

Pipelines are long-term investments, and locking ourselves in based on the expectation that we’ll have low natural gas prices forever doesn’t make sense, especially in the face of multiple fossil fuel price shocks in the past few years alone.

3. More methane supply hasn’t led to lower methane prices.

Pipeline boosters usually fall back on a simplistic Economics 101 argument that more methane gas supply will lower prices. But the facts show it hasn’t.

An Acadia Center analysis shows that: “between 2010 and 2024, gas transmission capacity into New England actually increased by about a third, but gas prices rose nevertheless.” Outside of a textbook in the real world, where regional and global market interactions have complicated effects, the evidence doesn’t support their claims.

4. Gas pipelines are almost certain to become stranded assets.

Investing billions of dollars in expensive, polluting infrastructure that will be economically underwater in a few short years is a bad idea and will leave electricity customers on the hook for higher costs.

Building a new gas pipeline is an economic commitment measured in decades. In the past few years, the costs of solar, wind, and batteries have declined steeply to where today they are some of the cheapest new sources of electricity we can build. It is likely that clean energy will keep dropping in cost, making methane gas generation less and less competitive.

Most New England states have strong renewable energy laws in place, which will bring new zero-fuel-cost resources online in the coming years, outcompeting gas. Maine’s goal is to power our economy with 100% clean energy by 2040.

5. Building gas pipelines is expensive and risky, and Mainers shouldn’t be set up to be left holding the bag.

Building a new pipeline can’t be done without long-term commitments to purchase the methane gas at the end of the line, and large industrial and commercial consumers of natural gas aren’t willing to take the risk on their own. As the head of the organization that represents New England power plant owners said recently: “ The president [of the United States] could direct the Army Corps of Engineers to dig a trench from the Marcellus Shale fields to Boston, [a]nd unless there is a counterparty in Boston willing to sign a 20- or 30-year contract with the pipeline operators, I don’t know a single pipeline company that will lay an ounce of steel in the ground.”

If large energy utilities and corporations aren’t willing to bear the risk for gas pipeline projects, Maine ratepayers certainly shouldn’t. Any attempt to force Maine electric ratepayers to bear any costs or risks for a new pipeline is a step in the wrong direction.

6. Maine ratepayers shouldn’t subsidize out-of-state gas companies.

New pipelines aren’t likely to lower electricity prices or make us less dependent on expensive out-of-state fuels. New pipelines would likely add significant costs to Maine families and businesses to subsidize or otherwise pay for the pipeline project.

So, what is motivating pipeline fans? The most likely winners are big gas utilities, mostly in Massachusetts and Connecticut, who would leverage these new fossil fuel supplies to justify continuing to fight the transition to cleaner, more efficient heat pump heating. It doesn’t do anything for Mainers who would have to pay extra for the costs of a new pipeline through their electricity bills.