Solar Over Gas: CT Candidate's Plan to Lower Electric Bills

Connecticut residents watching their electric bills climb have heard plenty of explanations from politicians. Anne Weisberg, a candidate for state representative in the 108th District, says most of those explanations are pointing in the wrong direction.

Weisberg is running again to represent Sherman, New Fairfield, and parts of New Milford and Danbury. She is making energy costs a centerpiece of her campaign, and her argument is straightforward: solar power, not natural gas, is the path to lower bills.

The conflict in Iran has sharpened that argument. When oil and gas prices spike in response to geopolitical instability, Connecticut ratepayers feel it directly. The state’s dependence on fossil fuels for electricity generation leaves consumers with little protection when markets swing.

Weisberg says she saw the alternative up close. During her 2024 campaign, she knocked on doors across her district as electricity bills were climbing sharply. She heard the same complaint at house after house, with one exception. Homeowners with solar panels were not complaining.

“The only voters who didn’t complain about their bills were those with solar panels,” she said.

Now she is pushing for legislation to make solar more accessible and affordable. One significant obstacle, she argues, is the permitting process itself. According to the Environment America Research and Policy Center, Connecticut’s solar permitting requirements can add thousands of dollars to a typical residential installation. That extra cost prices out many households that would otherwise benefit.

Weisberg supports two bills currently moving through Hartford. The first, HB 5340, would legalize so-called plug-in or balcony solar panels. These small-scale units can be set up without rooftop installation or complex permitting, opening solar access to renters and homeowners who cannot take on a full installation. The second, HB 5036, is Governor Lamont’s proposal to streamline the residential solar permitting process more broadly.

She pushes back on critics, many of them Republican, who argue that solar incentives distort energy markets. Her response is blunt: the oil and gas industry has never competed without public subsidies. Congress added $40 billion in oil and gas subsidies last year, on top of federal support that stretches back to 1913. Solar incentives, by comparison, are modest.

Some Republicans have also targeted the “public benefits charge” on electric bills as a driver of rising costs. Weisberg calls that unfair. The charge funds programs with documented returns for ratepayers.

One of those programs is EnergizeCT, which provides energy audits and efficiency improvements such as sealing drafty windows and upgrading insulation. Eversource, the state’s largest utility, has called it “the most cost-effective policy tool to reduce energy bills, promote economic development, protect the environment, and provide energy security.” The program returns three dollars in benefits for every dollar spent.

Another program funded through the charge is the Connecticut Green Bank, which offers low-interest loans to homeowners, businesses, and houses of worship looking to add solar or make energy improvements. The Green Bank reports a sixfold return on investment and has been expanding its work in energy storage, which helps smooth out the reliability concerns that critics raise about solar.

The 108th District covers a mix of rural and small-city communities in northern Fairfield County, where property types vary widely. Homeowners with south-facing roofs and some savings can already go solar. Renters, condo owners, and households without capital cannot, at least not easily. The plug-in solar bill directly addresses that gap.

None of this is without opposition. Utilities and some legislators have raised questions about the costs solar owners shift to non-solar ratepayers. Those arguments will get a real test as both bills advance. But Weisberg is betting that voters who have watched their bills spike for the past two years are ready to hear a different conversation about where Connecticut gets its power and who controls the price of it.

The session is underway and both bills are in committee. How far they travel before adjournment will say something about whether Hartford is ready to move.