What is going on in Minnesota?
The election in Minnesota saw Democrats win all of the statewide races and flipped 18 seats in the Minnesota House of Representatives to take control of the chamber. The incoming Speaker of the House is Melissa Hortman (DFL-Brooklyn Park) who has been very influential on energy issues in her caucus and focused her legislation on promoting renewable energy policy in the past. Congressman Tim Walz (DFL) will become governor in January and he has been publicly supportive of increasing the renewable energy standard (RES) to 30% by 2050. There have been many news articles coming out of Minnesota since the election that quote members of the new majority in the House that are supportive of making widespread changes to energy policy during the next two years.
The Minnesota Senate was not up for election this year as they all serve four-year terms that will be up in 2020. The current partisan split in that chamber is 34-33 with the Republicans retaining the majority after winning a special election for a seat vacated by Sen. Michele Fischbach (R-Paynesville) who left her post under the rules of succession as Senate President to become Lieutenant Governor under DFL Governor Mark Dayton. The Senate Energy Committee Chair Sen. Dave Osmek (R-Mound), who toured coal country this past June with the Lignite Energy Council, has publicly stated that he is not interested in increasing the RES unless large hydro is included in the legislation. There will be many energy related proposals introduced this session that the LEC will be tracking and will make sure to provide weekly updates during the legislative session that begins on January 8, 2019.