The lack of natural gas from Yemen needed to generate electricity at New England power plants this summer has grid managers preparing for possible summer power disruptions, including the possibility of what are sometimes called rolling blackouts. In March, April and May of this year, terrorists in Yemen repeatedly destroyed natural gas pipelines, preventing the gas from being liquefied and loaded into LNG tankers for delivery to be used to generate electricity for New England, including the residents of the Cape and Martha’s Vineyard.

The disruption of LNG deliveries to the Distrigas terminal in Everett adds a new edge to the quandary of how to meet New England’s growing reliance on gas for electricity generation, an official of the North American Reliability Corporation told E & E News this month.

One option would be to build new pipelines for transporting East Coast shale gas to New England, while a second would be to build an LNG infrastructure for transporting shale gas from the south and west from new LNG export terminals in Louisiana and Texas. Once factored into the cost of my electricity, I can reasonably assure you, with close to 100 per cent certainty, that there will be a significant increase in the cost of our delivered electricity.

I suggest we let our representatives in Boston and Washington know that electricity powered by the rays from the sun, which costs zero, and does not emit carbon dioxide or greenhouse gases, might be a better solution to the reliance on foreign sources of fuel.

Peter Cabana
Vineyard Haven