Back
Two years ago, Massachusetts regulators created a framework for phasing out the use of natural gas in buildings — a groundbreaking move for the state’s decarbonization efforts. Today, however, momentum has slowed as gas companies clash with lawmakers, regulators, and advocates on a fundamental question: Are utilities legally obligated to provide gas service to any consumer who wants it?
The debate may seem arcane, but at stake is the speed and scope of Massachusetts’ clean energy transition — and one of the nation’s first major attempts at a managed shift away from gas.
National Grid, Eversource, and other gas utilities say the answer is a resounding yes. The ability of residents and businesses to choose gas service is a “fundamental right,” said Eversource spokesperson Olessa Stepanova: “We cannot force them off that service.”
On the other side of the argument, advocates contend that safeguarding public health and fighting climate change are urgent benefits that outweigh individual customers’ personal preferences for one kind of fuel. The obligation, in their view, is to provide functional heating — not a specific source. The utilities, they say, are looking for ways to delay an inevitable upheaval in their industry rather than collaborating on a smooth transition.
“They see this as an existential threat to their business model, and they are digging in. They’re not at the table,” said James Van Nostrand, who chaired the Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities when it issued the 2023 order, and who is now policy director at The Future of Heat Initiative.
Massachusetts has long been a leader in pushing for a transition away from using natural gas and other fossil fuels to heat buildings and to fuel stoves and dryers.
In October 2020, the state was one of the first in the nation to launch a “Future of Gas” investigation, a process examining how gas companies can play a role in the clean energy transition and what that should look like. In December 2023, the state Department of Public Utilities wrapped up the investigation with a 137-page report that spelled out a clear vision of stopping the expansion of gas service and decommissioning some portions of the infrastructure, but largely left it to lawmakers, regulators, and utilities to enact the principles outlined.
The future laid out in the document goes like this: Rather than automatically investing in new gas infrastructure or replacing aging pipes, utilities will look for opportunities to deploy “non-gas pipeline alternatives” — like geothermal networks, air-source heat pumps, energy efficiency, or demand response — that can meet customers’ needs. Gas utilities will proactively coordinate with electric utilities to ensure the poles and wires can accommodate, say, switching dozens of houses in an area to heat pumps. The order also calls for utilities to undertake demonstration projects to test out the process of transitioning neighborhood-scale portions of the gas system to electrified heat or thermal networks.
The order called for gas utilities to submit plans detailing how they would assess whether an area could be equally or better served by a non-gas option. They did so in April 2025, but there is a catch: Utilities insist that they need customers to agree to participate in any such alternatives.
“It’s very hard to accomplish any decommissioning if you have to have that 100% buy-in from all the customers,” Van Nostrand said.
At the heart of the utilities’ argument is the legal concept of “obligation to serve.” The idea, a common principle in utilities regulation, is that a gas utility can’t just cut off customers it is already serving; if you want to keep gas, you get to. Requiring customers to modify their equipment would infringe on their constitutional property rights, the gas utilities argue.
The Mass Coalition for Sustainable Energy, a coalition of business groups, labor unions, and professional associations, has its own concerns about accelerating a transition away from natural gas. The group argues that pushing customers from gas to electric heat could increase energy bills and possibly compromise grid reliability.
Advocates, however, say the utilities are seizing on the idea of obligation to serve to justify dragging their feet on a transition they don’t want to see happen.
“If policymakers are trying to do something utilities don’t like, delay is always a tool they will use to resist it,” said Caitlin Peale Sloan, vice president for Massachusetts at the Conservation Law Foundation.
What’s more, according to advocates, lawmakers, and the state attorney general’s office, is that the utilities are wrong on the law. They argue that utilities are allowed to withdraw gas service in certain circumstances, such as lack of payment or for reasons of health, safety, and other purposes defined in law. A climate law passed in 2024, they say, provides such a definition by specifically identifying the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions as a factor that may be considered when deciding whether gas service can be discontinued. It also specifies that regulators must consider whether “adequate substitutes” are available for heating and cooking.
Furthermore, the utilities’ argument about the importance of consumer choice ignores the fact that their position takes away choice from the households who would want to join a geothermal network, said Amy Boyd Rabin, vice president of policy and regulatory affairs for the Environmental League of Massachusetts.
“I want customers to be able to move into the future and not be weighted down by having to continue to pay for a fossil fuel infrastructure that they didn’t ask for and they don’t want,” she said.
The Department of Public Utilities is currently in the process of asking utilities for more details about their arguments and considering feedback from other stakeholders. Advocates expect that regulators will ultimately disagree with utilities’ understanding of the obligation to serve, sending the question to court.
Though Massachusetts was among the first to start formally planning a transition off gas, the utilities’ resistance means the process is moving too slowly, advocates said. And substantial progress is unlikely to occur until the question of what obligation to serve really entails is settled.
“That’s a very important legal question that underpins any attempt to move forward in a meaningful way on gas transition,” Peale Sloan said.
.svg)
