United States’ top developer of green energy has spent nearly six years undermining a clean power project.
NextEra’s campaign has delayed the power line’s construction for almost two years.
“It just shows you that these companies are not fundamentally allied with the climate movement, not fundamentally on the side of climate progress,” said Leah Stokes.
NextEra’s national fleet of wind and solar farms generate more renewable electricity than any other company in the country.
‘Disturbing evidence’
groups were directed by consultants working on behalf of NextEra
One of the groups, Alpine Initiatives, failed to register as a political action committee before making a $150,000 contribution to the Maine Democratic Party, a move that ethics officials said masked the source of payment from the public. The contribution was an attempt to ingratiate the consultants to Democratic officials as they looked for allies in their fight against the power line, the commission said.
second group led by NextEra-hired consultants, $50,000 for failing to register as a ballot committee after it hired field workers to gather signatures needed to place a question on the 2020 ballot that asked voters to block the line
NextEra spent more than $20 million to support this question, while Avangrid and Hydro-Québec, the Canadian utility that would send power to New England, put up more than $50 million in an attempt to defeat it.
Argued that the client would face “reputational harm” if the consent agreement identified it.
NextEra is the most valuable publicly traded power company in the country, with a market capitalization around $117 billion, and has pledged to achieve “real zero” emissions by eliminating carbon dioxide pollution from its operations by 2045.