The first solicitation for renewable energy — known as “83D” — will be announced in January, 2018. Full implementation won’t occur until 2027, though energy will begin to come online before then. By contrast, 5,000 MW of natural gas can be online within five years’ time. Renewables will begin to play a larger role in our energy mix, but this transition will take time, and as the President and CEO of ISO-New England recently noted, “the region is decades away from installing enough renewable resources and grid-scale energy storage to allow for complete independence from fossil fuels.” Natural gas is the best resource to help us maintain reliability and sustain economic growth as we move towards our lower carbon future.