In the weeks before Governor Maura Healey urged an expedited review of a natural gas pipeline expansion project, Eversource executives and lobbyists donated thousands of dollars to her campaign, campaign finance records show.
Facing steep pressure to slash energy prices, Healey says she has embraced an “all of the above” approach to energy, including backing the project, which would expand the capacity of a gas pipeline system Eversource uses in Southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island. But some climate advocates said they were troubled by the timing of the contributions.
In September, Eversource employees donated more than $9,000 to Healey and Lieutenant Governor Kim Driscoll, including $1,000 to each from chief executive Joseph Nolan Jr., the annual maximum individual contribution to a candidate. He has donated that amount to Healey most years and to Driscoll some years. The company’s chief financial officer and other top executives also contributed.
In total, Eversource employees have donated $9,975 to Healey and Driscoll this year. That is less than the $18,100 they contributed in 2022, when Healey was elected governor.
Lobbyists for firms representing Eversource gave an additional $7,800 to Healey and Driscoll in September.
Olessa Stepanova, a spokesperson for Eversource, said that lobbyists for a firm that works with the company held a fund-raiser for Healey and Driscoll on Sept. 17. Nolan joined as a host in his personal capacity, she said, and other Eversource employees attended.
A couple of weeks later, on Oct. 1, Healey sent a letter to US Energy Secretary Chris Wright urging an expedited review of a $300 million capacity expansion of Enbridge’s Algonquin gas pipeline system. State regulators have already approved a plan from Eversource to purchase gas from the expansion.
Healey wrote in the letter that she and Wright have a “mutual desire to get more US natural gas into New England,” reducing the region’s reliance on more expensive imported fuel and cutting costs for customers.
A Healey campaign spokesperson said the contributions did not influence the governor’s thinking on the project, which she has supported for more than a year.
Eversource employees also donated $450 to Healey’s Republican opponent, Mike Minogue. Employees of National Grid contributed $2,765 to Healey, $600 to Driscoll, and $746 to Minogue this year.
Some climate leaders have accused Healey of an about-face on natural gas; as attorney general, Healey opposed pipeline expansion projects in Massachusetts, arguing that increased gas capacity was not needed and would hamper climate progress.
But Healey has described her approach as consistent: She supports projects that will be a good deal for Massachusetts customers. The Healey administration has said the pipeline expansion project would supply 600,000 gas customers and lower bills by a total of $40 million each year.
Some climate advocates, however, said they were concerned that the contributions influenced Healey’s letter. They have argued that the expansion project would increase the state’s gas consumption at a time when it ought to be transitioning away from the fuel and disputed that the project would lower heating costs.
“You can’t help but think that the timing of the contribution is one that seeks a return from the governor,” said Itai Vardi, a research manager at the Energy and Policy Institute, a fossil fuel and utility watchdog group.
But others said the contributions were too small to move the needle. Healey has received more than $4 million in contributions in 2026, according to campaign finance records.
Brad Campbell, the president of the Conservation Law Foundation, described the donations as a “non-issue at this scale.”
“New England’s utilities do have undue influence on policy decisions, but not because roughly a dozen utility employees may, on their own, contribute to one or the other candidate,” he said.
William Hinkle, an Eversource spokesperson, said the company and its leadership have been “consistently vocal and transparent” in emphasizing the need for more energy supply to cut costs.
Hinkle said he did not believe the campaign contributions influenced the governor on the issue.
“We also respect our elected officials too much to believe that political donations can sway them from acting in what they believe is in the best interests of their constituents,” he said.
Supporting Eversource’s contract with the gas expansion project is a “no-brainer,” he said, because of the savings it will provide to Massachusetts natural gas customers.
Healey’s GOP opponents have also seized on the letter and the contributions as an opportunity to attack the governor.
“It is clear that Eversource wants [to] keep Maura Healey in office, which makes for a troubling pattern of contributions three weeks before an election,” said Amy Carnevale, chairwoman for the Massachusetts Republican Party, in a news release.
Minogue has supported increased investments in natural gas pipelines. In a social media post, he described Healey’s letter to the Trump administration as “following my lead.”
Kerry Patrick Lyons, a campaign spokesperson for the governor, said Healey would continue to pursue an all-of-the-above strategy to lower bills.
“Unlike Mike Minogue, who is an Eversource shareholder and profits off rising energy bills, Governor Healey has spent her career standing up for ratepayers and standing up to the utilities,” he said.
Minogue is an investor in Eversource, according to his statement of financial interests for 2025.
Some climate advocates said they were also concerned by Nolan’s remarks at a conference on Sept. 30.
Nolan, according to a recording Eversource shared on its website, said the governors of the states where the company does business — Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Connecticut — might “take a whack or knock at us.” Still, he said, they have told him: “Hey, nothing personal, Joe. You know you’re our friend.”
After the election, Nolan said, “You’re going to see the volume is going to go right down, and you won’t hear much of that.”
Vick Mohanka, chapter director at the Massachusetts Sierra Club, said the comments were a “hush-hush, wink-wink way to say that what they’re telling the public and what they’re actually doing are two different things.”
The Healey campaign did not comment on Nolan’s remarks.
Hinkle, the Eversource spokesperson, said, “It is an obligation of any governor in any state to maintain constructive working relationships with the major businesses in their state.”
Kate Selig can be reached at kate.selig@globe.com. Follow her on X @kate_selig.