The New Hampshire Senate is expected to vote today on the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.
The bill would force electricity producers to buy allowances in an auction to cover their carbon dioxide emissions. The money raised would be directed to energy efficiency projects, with a goal of lowering energy consumption, carbon dioxide emissions and potentially global warming.
But some say the costs of those allowances are unpredictable, and they’ll be passed on to residential, nonprofit and commercial consumers.
The bill adds New Hampshire to the other New England states, New York, New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland in a market-based, “cap and trade” program to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from the region’s power plants.
New Hampshire’s House passed the bill in March.