Listen to this articleOCEAN CITY — Maryland state energy officials said Friday that expanding the use of solar energy for the state’s power grid as the state moves away from fossil fuels will be a priority during the next legislative session.
Further regulation of the solar energy industry, including determining who can install solar panels where, was part of a broad discussion about the future of state energy policy at the Maryland Association of Counties summer conference in Ocean City.
“We will have important bills on the solar industry and reform (of renewable energy standards) next session,” said Senator Brian Feldman, a Montgomery County Democrat and chairman of his chamber’s Education, Energy and Environment Committee.
House Commerce Committee Chairman CT Wilson, a Charles County Democrat, said he would push for regulation of companies and individuals installing solar panels and ensure they have been inspected and certified.
Residential solar power will take a lot of the strain off the electric grid, but Wilson, like other panelists, said he doesn’t have solar panels on his home.
“It’s not that I don’t believe in solar energy,” Wilson said. “I don’t trust anyone to stand on my roof – and my investment – and potentially destroy it.”
Wilson also plans to reintroduce a bill that he says would make it easier for people to install solar panels on their land, which would also benefit farmers who may prefer to produce electrons rather than harvest crops.
“It’s very frustrating because some people just don’t agree with this kind of technology,” Wilson said. “The problem is we have to move forward as a state.”
Ahead of Friday’s panel discussion, Michael Sanderson, executive director of MACo, said the discussion on energy policy would certainly be the “sleeper topic” of the conference.
Kumar Barve, Maryland’s public service commissioner and former longtime Democratic delegate for Montgomery County, discussed with Feldman and Wilson plans and obstacles to building data centers, increasing wind energy production and the role nuclear energy could play in expanding energy production.
While Congress has provided large sums of money to state governments to implement clean energy projects in recent years, including hundreds of millions of dollars in the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, it has been up to state legislatures to determine what policies to pursue.
“I appreciate that the money is coming to us, but the question of how we use it and make policy is decided at the state and capital level,” Feldman said.
Feldman said there is a growing tension between the state’s climate goals and shift away from fossil fuels toward renewable energy on the one hand, and the capacity of the regional power grid to handle that shift on the other.
Advocates have raised concerns about additional costs for electricity customers and businesses. As the state tries to power homes, buildings and vehicles and encourages the construction of data centers that are sure to strain the grid, it is also contributing to a process that is leading to the closure of coal-fired power plants, including the Brandon Shores plant in the Curtis Bay industrial area of Anne Arundel County.
“The problem of too little power generation and too much demand impacts us in many different ways,” Feldman said.
