{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://goodlander.house.gov/media/press-releases/no-utility-giant-should-get-a-blank-check-goodlander-fights-mega-merger-that-would-hand-one-company-all-of-new-englands-nuclear-power-including-seabrook/", "\u201cNo Utility Giant Should Get a Blank Check\u201d: Goodlander Fights Mega-Merger That Would Hand One Company All of New England\u2019s Nuclear Power, Including Seabrook", "2026-09-30", "2026", "2026-09", "Democrat", "House", "NH", "Maggie Goodlander", "G000604", "goodlander.house.gov", "goodlander", "https://goodlander.house.gov/media/press-releases/", "scraper", "As Granite Staters face a more than 16% jump in electricity rates, Goodlander and 11 colleagues urge FERC to reject the $66.8 billion NextEra-Dominion deal unless the companies prove it won\u2019t raise costs\n\nConcord, N.H. \u2014 Congresswoman Maggie Goodlander (NH-02), a former top antitrust official at the Justice Department, and a coalition of 11 of her congressional colleagues pressed the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) this week to block the NextEra-Dominion merger unless the companies can prove it won\u2019t drive up costs for families. The deal would create the world\u2019s largest regulated electric utility and hand a single corporation control of Seabrook Station and New England\u2019s only other nuclear power plant.\n\nFor New Hampshire, the stakes could not be higher. The merger would put Seabrook and Connecticut\u2019s Millstone plant under common ownership, giving one company control over roughly a quarter of New England\u2019s electricity. In the lawmakers\u2019 words, that would mean \u201cconsiderable negotiating leverage over states and the ability to demand abusive terms at the expense of households.\u201d And because neither company is a regulated utility in New Hampshire, the state\u2019s Public Utilities Commission gets no say. FERC is the only regulator standing between Granite State families and a nuclear monopoly.\n\nMeanwhile, the $2.25 billion in bill credits NextEra is offering to win approval would go only to Dominion customers in Virginia and the Carolinas. Not one dollar would go to New Hampshire, which would shoulder the risk and get none of the reward.\n\nGranite Staters can\u2019t afford it. Residential electricity rates in New Hampshire jumped more than 16% over the past year, according to the Energy Information Administration\u2019s July data.\n\nGoodlander\u2019s advocacy comes as governors from five New England states have sounded the alarm and called for \u201cthe highest level of scrutiny\u201d of the deal.\n\n\u201cGranite Staters are already getting crushed by the cost of energy, and no utility giant should get a blank check to get even bigger on their backs,\u201d said Congresswoman Goodlander. \u201cThis deal would put Seabrook and every other nuclear plant in New England under one corporate roof, and New Hampshire wouldn\u2019t get a single vote on it. That\u2019s too much power in too few hands. Federal regulators must look under every rock, test every promise, and block this deal if it would do what so many corporate mergers have done before: stick families with higher bills. I spent years taking on corporate monopolies at the Justice Department. I know a bad deal when I see one, and I will keep fighting to put New Hampshire ratepayers ahead of utility profits.\u201d\n\nThe $66.8 billion deal would be the fourth-largest merger of all time, creating a company worth $420 billion. \u201cOur fundamental concern is that this new entity will be both a gigantic power generator and a gigantic power-providing utility,\u201d the lawmakers wrote. They warn that combining two major regulated utility businesses with extensive electricity-generation assets could allow the merged company to favor affiliates, shift costs to captive ratepayers, weaken competition in power markets, and discourage transmission investments that would bring lower-cost power into New England and other regions.\n\nUnder Section 203 of the Federal Power Act, FERC may approve the transaction only if it is consistent with the public interest and does not pose a risk of harmful cross-subsidization. The letter calls on the Commission to evaluate the merger\u2019s effects on competition, rates, regulation, transmission development, and regulated utility assets across all affected regions, including ISO New England. The lawmakers urge FERC to deny the application unless NextEra and Dominion demonstrate that the deal will have no adverse effect \u2013 now or in the future \u2013 on competition, rates, or regulation, and to remain skeptical of alleged mitigating conditions that have historically failed to protect consumers in past acquisitions. \u201cIf the present record is insufficient to make those findings,\u201d they wrote, \u201cthe Commission should deny the application.\u201d\n\nNextEra has already shown New Hampshire how far it will go to protect its profits, and it did so from Seabrook. In their joint statement, the five New England states pointed to NextEra\u2019s \u201chistory of using its already considerable resources to obstruct new transmission infrastructure projects that New England needs.\u201d The New England Clean Energy Connect transmission project was designed to deliver low-cost Quebec hydropower to ISO New England, and NextEra\u2019s Seabrook nuclear plant and oil-fired generation stood to lose significant revenue as a result. NextEra subsequently spent more than $20 million in an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to block the project, in order to deny a competing low-cost resource access to the market. When the company delayed upgrades at Seabrook needed to connect the line, FERC ordered it to act, and a federal appeals court upheld that order in 2024.\n\n\u201cThis isn\u2019t a merger. It\u2019s NextEra buying control of a state-granted monopoly and paying a multibillion-dollar premium for the privilege, and ratepayers shouldn\u2019t be stuck with that bill,\u201d said Marissa P. Gillett, Senior Fellow at the American Economic Liberties Project and former Chair of the Connecticut Public Utilities Regulatory Authority. \u201cNextEra has promised customer protections to win approval before, in Hawaii and Texas, and regulators rejected both deals. The law puts the burden on the companies to prove this deal won\u2019t raise rates or weaken competition. Bill credits and paper commitments don\u2019t meet that burden. Congresswoman Goodlander and her colleagues are right to hold FERC to that standard.\u201d\n\nA copy of the letter is available HERE.\n\nADDITIONAL BACKGROUND:\n\nGoodlander has made lowering energy and utility costs a central part of her work in Congress:\n\nTaking on utility rate hikes and monopoly power: Goodlander filed a petition to intervene in Liberty Utilities\u2019 pending rate case, called on the New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission to reconsider Eversource\u2019s 43.4 percent rate increase, and helped introduce the Lowering Utility Bills Act to rein in excessive profits by investor-owned utilities.\n\nExpanding affordable, reliable power: Goodlander introduced bipartisan, bicameral legislation to accelerate hydropower production and lower energy costs and has championed bipartisan legislation to support upgrades at existing hydroelectric facilities, strengthen grid reliability, and lower costs.\n\nDemanding utility accountability: Goodlander pressed Liberty Utilities for answers after the company refused new gas connections in the Lakes Region and has urged FERC to crack down on utilities\u2019 attempts to overcharge customers.\n\nBringing antitrust experience to Congress: Before Congress, Goodlander served as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Justice Department\u2019s Antitrust Division, where she took on corporate monopolies driving up costs for families and small businesses.\n\n###", 1, "2026-10-01T11:23:28Z", "2026-10-01T11:25:15Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://goodlander.house.gov/media/press-releases/no-utility-giant-should-get-a-blank-check-goodlander-fights-mega-merger-that-would-hand-one-company-all-of-new-englands-nuclear-power-including-seabrook/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.25022791326046, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}