OREANDA-NEWS. The governors of six New England states are renewing their vows to unite to reduce consistently high electricity prices by using their collective clout to expand energy infrastructure now considered inadequate for the region.

The renewed effort could offer a path around the roadblocks that doomed an earlier regional energy initiative. That effort launched in late 2013 but was abandoned less than a year later amid legal threats over the plan to fund energy infrastructure with a fee collected by New England's grid operator that would require federal approval.

The new plan, unveiled yesterday, would use individual state laws to collectively support new infrastructure that could help the whole region. The governors said they adopted the plan because their energy problems were "greater than any one state can solve alone." They highlighted new pipelines and transmission infrastructure as potential solutions.

The governors will have to overcome the difficulty of getting multiple states to rally behind a few large projects, along with the free-rider problem of states that have an incentive to under-invest while benefiting from new regional infrastructure. Power plant owners argue the plan would be an illegal state interference into deregulated power markets.

But the plan may be gaining momentum. Massachusetts utility regulators will respond next week to a request governor Charlie Baker (R) made on 2 April to begin an investigation into whether local electric utilities could contract for pipeline capacity that would go to gas-fired generators. The state, as the largest electricity consumer in New England, is critical to the initiative's success.

Connecticut and Rhode Island, working with Massachusetts, earlier this year put out a request for proposals for regional energy solutions.