Clean Energy Program

The Clean Energy Program aims to achieve the first of the Renewable Energy Trust’s fundamental goals: to shift the state toward a greater reliance on renewable energy resources to meet energy needs in the Commonwealth.

Here are the program’s current initiatives, by category:

Education and Outreach:

The K-12 Education Initiative educates the next generation of consumers and voters by incorporating renewable energy into the curriculums of schools throughout Massachusetts.

The Public Awareness Initiative encompasses a wide range of activities, including the Clean Energy Tour, that seek to increase the profile of renewable energy with the public.

Consumer Clean Energy Purchasing:

The Clean Energy Choice program makes it more desirable, more beneficial, and safer for consumers to make voluntary green electricity purchases. The program enables some payments to be tax deductible for federal income taxes and provides matching grants that benefit consumers’ communities and low-income residents.

Clean Energy Development:

The Massachusetts Green Power Partnership helps developers to secure financing for proposed renewable generation facilities by guaranteeing a revenue stream from the sale of renewable energy certificates.

The Predevelopment Financing Initiative provides financial assistance to developers as they undertake the high-risk, early-stage activities related to the development of new renewable energy facilities.

The Community Wind Collaborative helps cities and towns across the Commonwealth develop small-scale, community-owned wind projects. The Trust is currently working with more than 40 communities.

Planning and Policy:

The Offshore Wind Energy Collaborative's goal is
to overcome the barriers to generating and delivering electricity from U.S. offshore wind farms at a competitive cost by the beginning of the next decade.

Cape and Islands Offshore Wind Stakeholder Process was used as part of the permitting for the Cape Wind project. The Trust acted as a neutral broker in this valuable process.

Siting & Planning activities provide communities and regions within the Commonwealth with tools and resources they need to make sound renewable energy decisions. MTC encourages open constructive dialogue among constituencies that have an interest in the outcome of proposed projects.