Tom Irwin is Vice President and Director of Conservation Law Foundation New Hampshire.

Facing the prospect of the Trump administration’s recently imposed tariffs on products from Canada, one of the largest suppliers of gasoline and heating oil to New Hampshire announced it may have to charge families more to heat their homes and fill their gas tanks. Meanwhile, war and market turmoil are pushing the cost of natural gas to create electricity to record highs.

This is not the time for the legislature to make us even more dependent on oil, gas and coal.

Newly filed bills pending before the legislature and supported by the fossil fuel industry’s lobbyists would not only undermine the growth of homegrown clean, reliable and affordable energy, they would cut us off from thousands of new jobs. These bills would also greatly weaken New Hampshire’s renewable energy laws.

HB 219 proposes decreasing minimum solar energy requirements and preventing most energy generated from the offshore wind projects from being eligible under the state’s Renewable Portfolio Standard. HB 224 would eliminate the state’s Renewable Energy Fund, which helps fund renewable energy projects that benefit homeowners, businesses, and cities and towns. HCR 4 would effectively prevent New Hampshire from participating in offshore wind projects altogether.

New England’s ocean has some of the best sites in the United States for the production of reliable clean wind energy. Port redevelopment and high-paying job creation are already happening in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut. Turbines are already spinning off New England’s coast and creating electricity to light and heat thousands of homes. The federal government has leased 440,000 acres of the Gulf of Maine to four potential floating turbine projects 60 miles from the New Hampshire coast and carefully sited to avoid fishery damage.

The New Hampshire Department of Energy has estimated that a single 1,200 MW offshore wind project in the Gulf of Maine would generate over 3,600 jobs and over $840 million in benefits for the state. Offshore wind not only keeps the jobs and project development benefits here but it also makes electricity affordable. If New England reaches its offshore wind targets by 2030, a study by Synapse Energy Economics predicts a $630 million reduction in electricity costs for the region.

Unlike coal, oil, and gas, wind is free, clean and found in unlimited supply. Shutting the door to an energy future provided by wind and undermining support for other renewables like solar would greatly impede a New Hampshire energy future that avoids vulnerabilities to tariffs, war or shifts in supply.

And the jobs that come with building and these sources of clean energy aren’t in Louisiana, Texas or the Middle East – they’re right here in New England. While there already are more than 3,500 jobs in renewable energy in the Granite State, mostly in solar power, we lag behind our neighbors in renewable energy jobs and have room for significant growth, growth that would be impeded by these anti-renewables bills.

As the rest of the world is turning to energy supplied by the wind and the sun, these bills would greatly undermine a robust clean energy future for New Hampshire, hindering the growth of energy that is not only better for our health and our planet, but is also inexpensive and homegrown.

It is time for New Hampshire to embrace a clean energy future, not build barriers to it.