Cambridge Planning Board Receives Sweeping Utility and Decarbonization Briefing

CAMBRIDGE -- June 11, 2024, Cambridge Planning Board spent its June 11 meeting on an all-presentations utility briefing with no votes taken. City Engineer Jim Wilcox reported that 45 percent of Cambridge's sewer system remains combined, with a joint Cambridge-Somerville-MWRA overflow control plan due in draft form by December 2025, the first such plan to incorporate 2050 climate projections into its rainfall modeling. Water Department staff said per-capita daily use has dropped to approximately 45 gallons, well below the federal 65-gallon benchmark, and water main breaks fell to a record low of 31 in 2023. Vicinity Energy president Kevin Hagerty announced a 42-megawatt electric boiler going online at Kendall Station in September 2024 and a 35-megawatt river-source heat pump slated for 2028 that he called "the largest heat pump in North America" and the first deployment of the European technology in the United States. Eversource told the board its next three-year efficiency plan targets more than $1 billion in equity-sector investment and installation of more than 115,000 heat pumps, while the company's Electric Sector Modernization Plan projects statewide peak demand growing from 6.1 gigawatts today to 15.4 gigawatts by 2050.