(WBFF) — With concerns about high energy bills top of mind for many residents, a new report released Wednesday criticized Baltimore Gas and Electric (BGE), arguing the way the utility company spends money on gas infrastructure projects drives up prices for residents.
The report, “Fast-Tracked and Flawed,” an analysis of BGE’s 2025 Operation Pipeline projects, was written by the advocacy organization Maryland PIRG.
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“Over the last decade, Baltimore Gas and Electric has failed to appropriately address the public safety risk it invokes to justify Operation Pipeline, its gas pipe replacement program. BGE has housed Operation Pipeline within its STRIDE work, which allows the company to charge customers for gas infrastructure replacements more quickly. Instead of implementing a program that optimizes investment for risk reduction, the company is conducting a broad and expensive system-wide pressure conversion,” the report read. “Operation Pipeline is failing: it is not properly prioritizing safety and is driving up gas delivery rates at an unsustainable pace, which places an unjustified and unnecessary affordability burden on gas customers and risks saddling ratepayers with billions of dollars of stranded assets.”
“The analysis finds that BGE is not properly, adequately prioritizing safety when selecting projects for its multi-billion dollar gas pipeline replacement program,” said Emily Scarr, an author of the PIRG report.
Through BGE’s Operation Pipeline project, the utility identified numerous pipes needing to be replaced, including aging cast iron pipes, which BGE officials said are crumbling and at risk of leaking. However, during a press conference Wednesday, critics, including Baltimore City Council members, argued BGE was prioritizing different types of pipes, driving up prices and profits.
“BGE operation pipeline program, which operates under Maryland STRIDE law, has emphasized costly pressure conversions, which require the expensive and time consuming replacement of new plastic pipes and working regulators, in addition to legacy pipes,” Scarr said.
“This report confirms that BGE does not prioritize replacing hazardous, unsafe pipes, that pose safety risks. Instead, they’re focused on upgrading their entire system, pipe by pipe,” Baltimore City Council President Zeke Cohen said.
However, Nick Alexopulos, a spokesperson for BGE, strongly disagreed with the report.
“That’s abject nonsense,” he said. “We have focused on replacing the riskiest infrastructure for decades. In 2025, 85% of our planned operation pipeline work was abandoning cast iron main that number was conveniently left out of the report they issued today.”
Alexopulos said BGE is not upgrading the entire gas system, but are replacing the riskiest 12% of it. He added that the Maryland Public Service Commission approves the projects and spending in question.
“From a transparency standpoint, we file with the commission the technical specs of all of these projects,” Alexopulos said. “We’ve been doing it for 11 years. And how many have been deemed ineligible to be done? Zero.”
He also said many cast iron pipes are low pressure, and low pressure pipes have also been recognized to pose risks.
“No legitimate regulatory body or industry expert would argue it’s wasteful to replace low pressure gas infrastructure,” he added in an email Wednesday afternoon.
