The home heating oil industry has a long and proud history, and Fuel Oil News has been there supporting it since 1935. It is an industry that has faced many challenges during that time. In its 77th year, Fuel Oil News is doing more than just holding
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/656854
www.fueloilnews.com | FUEL OIL NEWS | APRIL 2016 13 Vermont A natural gas pipeline, leasing of cold- climate heat pumps by an electric utility and a proposed tax on carbon emissions are hot button issues in the Granite State, said Matt Cota, executive director of the Vermont Fuel Dealers Association, based in Berlin, Vt. Cota said the retail fuel oil marketers of Vermont are battling on two fronts against Gaz Metro, a Quebec-based com- pany whose subsidiary, Northern New England Energy Corp., based in South Burlington, is the parent of both an elec- tric utility in the state, Green Mountain Power, and a natural gas company, Vermont Gas Systems. The natural gas company is in the process of extending a pipeline from Burlington southward to Middlebury, with plans for a second stage that would extend farther south into Rutland County; a third stage would extend the pipeline under Lake Champlain to an International Paper Mill in Ticonderoga, N.Y. " T h e y h a v e a p p r o v a l t o g o t o Middlebury, but they are fighting some eminent domain cases," Cota said. Opponents of the pipeline project have disrupted eminent domain hearings "about five times," Cota said "On the other front," Cota said, "cold- climate heat pumps are being actively leased by our electric utility"—˙Green Mountain Power. The pumps provide air conditioning in the summer and heat in the winter. The utility is actively marketing pump leases to their electric customers "as a way to boost electricity" revenues, Cota said. The utility also ties the pump leases to solar installations, which are growing in Vermont, he said. The cold-climate heat pumps do not replace oil heat, but in providing warm air to a room, they reduce heating oil consump- tion, Cota said. A drawback of the pumps is that electricity consumption—and electric- ity bills—go up "by quite a bit," he said. "From a price perspective the last six months have been very advantageous to the oil heat industry because there is no less expensive way to heat your home than oil heat," Cota said. "We've been the price leader for six months now and that has certainly slowed down conversions and sales of supplemental heat." But there is a proposal in the Vermont legislature to create a carbon tax on fuel oil, diesel and gasoline, with the intent of raising the price and forcing people to use less fossil fuels, Cota said. If passed, implementation of the tax would be staggered over ten years but would add up to about a dollar a gallon for heating oil based on a hundred dollars per metric ton, according to the legisla- ture's calculations, Cota said. Retailers would have to pay based on the carbon emissions of the fuel they sell. The legislation was drafted about a year ago and is still under consideration, though Cota said, "It is highly unlikely that it will pass this year. We have actively opposed it, and thousands of people have signed a petition demand- ing lawmakers vote no. I'm told it won't even come to a vote, but that's this year. This issue isn't going away. There's an army of advocacy groups that believe this is the way forward… We think it would be economically disastrous. The business community agrees. We're fairly confident that we can defeat it, but that doesn't diminish the threat." Approximately half the homes in Vermont have oil-burning equipment, Cota said. Propane and natural gas each account for about 18% of homes and wood-burning equipment accounts for the balance, he said. l F O N