BALTIMORE — With less than two weeks left in the energy-dominated 2026 legislative session, Maryland senators clashed for nearly four hours Thursday over whether to prioritize immediate utility relief or long-term investments to stabilize the power grid.

The partisan divide was on full display during debate over Senate Bill 841, the Senate’s version of a sweeping utility relief package. Democrats in both chambers have said the measure would lower customer costs over the next several years through grid upgrades, new generation, tighter utility oversight and $150 in annual rebates for ratepayers.

Republicans, led by Senate Minority Leader Steve Hershey, maintained that the legislation does too little to reduce monthly bills and relies too heavily on renewable energy programs funded by ratepayers.

“What ratepayers want to see is what we’re doing in Annapolis right now to lower electricity bills,” Hershey told reporters ahead of the debate, previewing a slate of GOP amendments aimed at immediate savings. “The easiest things that we’ve seen are to go back on some of the (green) policies that have been created over the last few years … and repeal them.”

Democrats countered that the legislation must be judged as part of a multi-year push to address Maryland’s supply-demand imbalance and prevent future price spikes tied to data centers and PJM Interconnection capacity market.

“The bill needs to be viewed as part of a broader effort to address some of our short-term, medium and longer-term issues that we can control in the General Assembly,” said Sen. Brian Feldman, chair of the Senate Education, Energy and the Environment Committee.

Feldman said the comprehensive package passed his committee 9-1 this week and urged colleagues to evaluate it holistically, adding that “it is easy to cherry-pick and be critical of one portion of the bill for not doing enough.”

One of the sharpest points of contention centered on data centers, which both parties increasingly see as central to Maryland’s energy future, despite opposition from environmental advocates.

As opposed to the House’s version of the bill, large data centers would be subject to a special tariff designed to hold them accountable for transmission costs under the Senate bill. The measure would also create a tiered incentive system for facilities that invest in energy storage, purchase clean power or participate in demand-reduction programs.

Top-tier projects would receive expedited permitting — within 12 months — from the Maryland Department of the Environment, priority in interconnection and the option to speed up infrastructure development.

Still, Hershey said Maryland remains a less attractive destination than neighboring states because of regulatory uncertainty, clean energy mandates and limits on how quickly large customers can bring their own generation online.

“I don’t think the incentives … (are) going to incentivize data centers to come here,” Hershey said, adding that companies will instead choose states with cheaper natural gas and more flexible generation options. “If (data centers) do go to Pennsylvania or Virginia, they will get the economic benefits of having a data center there, but the grid will still be no less strained.”

Sen. Katie Fry Hester, who introduced the data center amendments in committee, said Maryland remains an attractive market and that lawmakers are trying to balance economic growth with protecting residential customers from rising grid costs.

“We have long lines of data centers banging on our doors,” she said. “The bill is carefully balanced to be a combination of carrots and sticks … But the incentives, colleagues, will draw the data centers who are willing to be those good grid citizens. It will bring those data centers to Maryland.”

Feldman said 75% of recent rate increases are tied to data center growth and defended provisions requiring developers to cover interconnection and infrastructure costs. The bill would also lower the threshold for large-load tariffs from 100 megawatts to 25 megawatts, expanding the number of projects subject to the policy.

Despite the sharp debate, senators adopted several bipartisan amendments before advancing the bill toward a final vote, approving three of nine Republican proposals.

The closest vote, 20-19, approved an amendment from Sen. J.B. Jennings requiring utilities or transmission developers to notify affected and adjacent landowners by certified mail before hearings on proposed transmission lines. The amendment would also grant residents the right to intervene in Public Service Commission, PSC, proceedings and invalidate hearings if the commission finds notice failures were willful.

Other Republican-backed amendments were accepted as “friendly” and passed without a floor vote.

One, from Sen. Jon Corderman, would bar the PSC from prohibiting utilities from offering discounts or payment plans for natural gas line connections or extensions — an issue he linked to stalled housing development in Western Maryland.

“Eliminating this long-standing approach significantly impacts energy choice, housing affordability and local economic development across the state,” he said.

The amendment drew criticism from consumer and climate advocates. In an email to The Baltimore Sun, Annette McDermott of Sunstone Strategies said preserving line extension allowances could cost gas customers nearly $1 billion over the next decade, citing estimates from the Maryland Office of People’s Counsel.

Another amendment, from Senate Minority Whip Justin Ready, would require the commission to develop grid utilization metrics and updated utility planning requirements. “This amendment really is about looking at the overall structure of what we’re doing on grid management,” he said.

Democrats also introduced and passed three amendments expanding rooftop community solar eligibility and tightening limits on which utility executive salaries can be passed on to ratepayers.

The broader dispute centered on what constitutes meaningful affordability relief.

Republicans unsuccessfully pushed amendments to withdraw Maryland from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, alter the state’s renewable portfolio standard and pause future EmPOWER spending. Hershey said those proposals would have produced faster and larger savings.

Hershey said those changes would have produced larger and faster savings than the Democratic package.

Feldman said the bill already includes roughly $500 million in EmPOWER-related relief and $100 million from the Strategic Energy Investment Fund to offset costs. He also pointed to provisions capping ratepayer-funded executive compensation at $250,000, eliminating certain utility return adders and closing loopholes that allow some underground transmission projects to bypass state review.

“We’re not playing the one-month game here,” Feldman said. “We’re playing the two-, three-, four-, five-year game.”

The bill is expected to receive a final Senate vote Monday before heading to the House. The House passed its version last week; it now awaits Senate consideration after both chambers adopted different amendments.

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