By GARRY RAYNO, Distant Dome
Affordability is an interesting word, because it is so subjective.
What makes one thing affordable and something else unaffordable?
A new car becomes affordable when your car does not pass inspection (a thing of the past in New Hampshire in a month or two), but the same car would be unaffordable if your car is running well and not rusted from all salt dumped on New Hampshire roads.
That guitar you always dreamed about owning becomes affordable when your guitar’s neck is warped and the estimate for the neck reset will cost you almost as much as the new guitar.
But there are other things that are more objective such as the price of gas, which you can do little about except shop around for the cheapest price as long as you don’t have to travel too far.
The price of eggs or milk or meat or fish or other essential foods also are more objective when it comes to affordability.
Cell phones are a necessity today, but do you need a new one every year or two years because you are obsessed with the latest devices with all the new bells and whistles.
New cell phones are not “affordable” for most people if you have to pay for them up front, but the carriers have deals and monthly plans to pay them off over time.
Another necessity is electricity. Most people do not have the luxury of generating their own electricity or being off the grid, and have to pay what utilities charge with the blessing of state regulators and they don’t offer installment plans unless you are really poor.
And state regulators in New Hampshire gave the state’s largest electric utility Eversource a gift this year by replacing traditional rate making with automatic rate increases projected to reflect inflationary increases.
Such decisions by the Public Utilities Commission should be a reminder why New Hampshire has some of the highest rates for electricity in the country. New England in general has high electric rates, but New Hampshire’s are the highest.
A look at the daily price board at the regional system operator’s — Independent System Operator(ISO) New England — website and you will see New Hampshire usually has the highest daily spot market price in New England.
New Hampshire has long generated more electricity than it needs due to several large providers like Seabrook Station, the state’s only nuclear power plant, and Merrimack Station, New England’s last coal burning generating plant that is about to shut down. The last few years the plant has only run sporadically as it removed from the base suppliers and has “peaker status,” which means it is only used when the electric load is at its highest.
New Hampshire also has several natural-gas-fired plants, one sort of oil-fired plant and several wood burners as well as some hydro generating facilities along the state’s major rivers.
Outside of Seabrook’s power, fossil fuels are producing the bulk of the power the state produces.
Massachusetts is about to begin receiving 1,200 megawatts of Hydro Quebec power which was first going to traverse New Hampshire from the Canadian border to Deerfield for the Northern Pass transmission project, until regulators killed it.
So instead the Hydro Quebec power is coming through Maine to hook into the New England grid so Massachusetts can receive the benefit of cheaper, cleaner power it has sought for a decade or more.
Massachusetts and other New England states have sought to broaden the sources of their electricity to include renewable energy derived from wind, water and the sun, while New Hampshire has lagged far behind.
New Hampshire energy policy has longed clung to the belief that fossil fuel generated electricity is cheaper than that produced by renewable and alternative sources, but the equation is changing with solar power becoming competitive as is large wind generated power like those proposed offshore while the large hydro projects like those in Canada produce electricity cheaper than fossil fuels, whose costs are volatile on the world market.
Earlier this year, New Hampshire passed a new state energy policy following in the footsteps of the sitting president who unilaterally cancelled several offshore wind projects ready to go, including one off the New England coast.
In the 2025 session lawmakers approved House Bill 682, which sponsors said would focus the state’s energy needs on market driven, affordable and efficient sources, i.e. fossil fuel generation.
The bill also removed the Office of Wind Energy from the Department of Energy, repealed the offshore wind industry workforce training center committee and the offshore and port development commission, and moved the grid modernization advisory council and the hydrogen advisory council to the office of energy innovation.
The changes are designed to align with President Trump’s executive order to eliminate offshore wind and turbine development, according to bill supporters.
Opponents called the state’s new energy plan backward looking and said it would lock the state out of any wind power development in the Gulf of Maine.
New Hampshire lawmakers have also been slow to embrace net metering in any large scale way, which allows people with solar panels to sell the excess energy created to the public utility.
The bill that passed was model legislation developed by the American Legislative Exchange Council, a group established in 1973 by a number of conservative organizations and major companies associated with the fossil fuel, pharmaceutical, tobacco, insurance, chemical, alcohol and various other groups with a far-right libertarian agenda.
A fair number of Republican legislators in New Hampshire are members and often attend the group’s national convention and this summer a photo was sent around showing about 20 to 25 GOP House and Senate members there.
The conventions are free to the lawmakers who have their expenses paid while lobbyists and industry experts “teach” them how to craft bills that become model legislation that often shows up before the New Hampshire legislature on any number of issues from transgender medicine to voting rights.
But a fair number of the Republicans on the House Science, Technology and Energy Committee were pictured at the convention including chair Michael Vose, R-Epping.
The organization has long been linked to the Koch Foundation as one of its founders came from the Heritage Foundation which has been supported by the Kochs and ALEC is on the board of Project 2025 overseen by the Heritage Foundation.
The Koch brothers first made their fortune by under-representing the amount of oil they pumped from reservations owed by indigenous people as the film Killer of the Flower Moon portrayed.
A number of GOP lawmakers in New Hampshire also belong to the Young Americans for Liberty offshoot for state lawmakers that host similar “seminars” to influence lawmakers in various ways and likewise provides free trips to these events.
American for Prosperity, a Koch affiliated group, dumped about $1 million in each of the last three general elections into New Hampshire House and Senate races, very successfully.
That has been a very good investment for the fossil fuel industry, but maybe not so good for those who have to pay the high price of electricity in New Hampshire because it is so dependent on fossil fuel to generate it.
How far down does this influence reach?
A bill coming before the House in the first week of the 2026 session, House Bill 610, would limit the purview of the state’s Consumer Advocate for Residential Customers, “to focus exclusively on assuring that residential utility customers receive safe and reliable service at the lowest possible cost while maximizing customer freedom and autonomy.”
The original bill would have eliminated the position, but this one prevents the consumer advocate from advocating for renewable energy projects or energy efficiency programs that also might save residential and all customers a little money because in the New Hampshire legislature oil money speaks louder than the voices of ratepayers.
Garry Rayno may be reached at garry.rayno@yahoo.com
Distant Dome by veteran journalist Garry Rayno explores a broader perspective on the State House and state happenings for InDepthNH.org. Over his three-decade career, Rayno covered the NH State House for the New Hampshire Union Leader and Foster’s Daily Democrat. During his career, his coverage spanned the news spectrum, from local planning, school and select boards, to national issues such as electric industry deregulation and Presidential primaries. Rayno lives with his wife Carolyn in New London.