All graphs courtesy of Renewable Energy Vermont.

Peter Sterling

The last few weeks have laid bare the agenda of the Trump Administration and Vermont Governor Phil Scott to roll back progress on fighting climate change and the deployment of renewable energy.

President Trump issued an executive order on his very first day in office freezing all approvals for offshore wind, threatening dozens of projects. Offshore wind is a key part of bringing on the massive new generation needed to get New England’s electric sector off fossil fuels.

In addition, new EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin has pledged to take back the nearly $20B committed by the Biden Administration to help low-income Americans share in the benefits of electrification and go solar. This includes nearly $63M Vermont was slated to receive under the Solar for All program championed by Senator Bernie Sanders. Under Solar for All, thousands of low income Vermonters will get access to solar power who live in affordable housing developments, through community solar program for renters and others, and at home through on site net metered solar.

In 2024, the Vermont Legislature overrode Governor Phil Scott’s veto to enact the landmark 100% Renewable Energy Standard (RES), arguably the most aggressive renewable energy requirement in the nation. Vermont’s RES removes the GHG equivalent of taking 470,000 cars off the road by 2035.

This year in the Vermont Statehouse, 24 House Republicans have sponsored H.159 to completely eliminate the RES. The chart below shows how drastically different Vermont’s greenhouse gas emissions would look without the RES’ renewable energy requirements.

Vermont Governor Phil Scott is supporting H.289 which would eliminate Vermont’s mandatory greenhouse gas reduction requirements and slow or even eliminate the RES’ requirement for deploying distributed solar in Vermont. Targeting Vermont’s one-of-a-kind-in-New England in state distributed generation requirement, these measures would make it nearly impossible to build solar 1-5MW in size in Vermont.

• It’s disappointing that Governor Scott and his Public Service Department (PSD) once again fail to account for the many benefits to Vermonters from keeping their energy dollars in state. REV’s research found that:
• In 2024, 30 MW of in-state solar was built in Vermont generating $75m-$100m in direct economic activity, over 30% of which comes from federal tax incentives and grants
• Updated RES requirements will almost double this install rate – between 300 and 375 MW of new in-state solar by 2030
• The RES law generated $126m in benefits to Vermont ratepayers between 2025-2035. 94% of these benefits came from in-state RES requirements.
• According to Vermont’s annual Clean Energy Industry Report, the renewable energy sector employed 5,622 people in 2024

Finally, the PSD published a report in January that recommends the Public Utility Commission lower the compensation Vermonters receive when enrolling in net metering, making rooftop and backyard solar even more expensive and inaccessible. The PUC has already lowered the compensation for net metering seven times in the last eight years and its impact on going solar in Vermont is clear from the graphics below.