PROVIDENCE — There’s likely nothing in the state as unpopular as utility bills this year, but as the state moves to overhaul its renewable energy programs, some lawmakers are working to ensure Rhode Island doesn’t throw out the baby with the bathwater.

Through much of this session, Rep. Lauren Carson, D-Newport, has been working behind the scenes to save the state’s Renewable Energy Standard (RES), the law that mandates Rhode Island must source all retail electricity from renewable sources by 2033.

The RES was one of a suite of initiatives, funded by state charges on residents’ monthly electric and gas bills, that faced drastic cuts in Gov. Dan McKee’s proposed state budget in January.

In a bid to save ratepayers an estimated $1 billion over the next five years, the McKee administration proposed capping energy efficiency budgets, net metering, and pushing the RES deadline out to 2050.

The RES is a key plank in Rhode Island’s plan to meet the successive mandates of the Act on Climate law, which requires the state achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. The state’s Climate Action Strategy says Rhode Island will reach its 2030 benchmark goal of a 45% reduction of greenhouse gas emissions below 1990 standards — but only if the current RES is in place.

“We as a House of Representatives need more information before we can make long-term decisions about renewable energy,” said Carson in a House Corporations Committee meeting, introducing her own bill to retain the RES. “It’s a very complicated topic and most of us have limited knowledge on it.”

The RES operates by attaching a Renewable Energy Certificate (REC) to electricity generated by renewable resources such as solar or wind power. Utility companies show compliance by purchasing the certificates and putting them toward a certain compliance year.

Carson’s legislation would make several minor alterations to how the RECs are defined and counted. It would expand the definition for RECs to include nuclear power and hydropower, and adjust the alternative compliance payments — made when the required RECs in a year are not met — in line with neighboring states.

In a key point for environmental groups, it would also keep the final year for 100% compliance with the standard as 2033.

McKee’s latest proposed changes, submitted via budget amendments last month, would still push the final deadline for the RES to 2050, while also including a parallel clean energy standard for nuclear and hydropower. The governor’s office estimated that McKee’s proposed changes would save ratepayers around $53.4 million next year, and a total of $528.2 million in compliance costs over the next five years.

Money for compliance with the RES is collected as an itemized charge on monthly gas and electric bills. Nicholas Ucci, a lobbyist working for Rhode Island Energy and former chief of the state Office of Energy Resources, has said Rhode Islanders paid about $8 a month in RES compliance costs.

Ucci, speaking for the utility company, said it was broadly supportive of Carson’s changes to the standard. One change Rhode Island Energy would prefer to see, Ucci wrote in testimony, was to push the RES deadline back by seven years to 2040 to save costs.

“By leaving the RES schedule as is heading into the next decade, ratepayers may be asked to pay hundreds of millions more in compliance costs when compared to a prudently adjusted 100% clean energy by 2040 standard,” Ucci wrote.

Paring back on the current schedule for the standard, however, could set back renewable energy development in the region. The RES has been state law in Rhode Island since 2004 and provides a growing demand for renewable energy and incentives for developments to be built.

Pushing back the final deadline could also devalue the current market for RECs, and depress the development of renewable energy, while curbing the jobs that go with building solar installations and wind turbines.

But concerns about energy costs, which have been high for the last four straight winters, have reached a fever pitch in recent months as gasoline and heating reaches record highs thanks to war with Iran.

There’s other benefits for ratepayers as well. By adding additional energy generators onto the electric grid, the RES can help electricity prices stay more affordable in the long term, crucial in a region reliant on natural gas and other fossil fuels sourced elsewhere in the globe and vulnerable to geopolitical events.

“We know that renewables will give us lower costs once the investments are made,” Carson said. “We know the Iran war has caused a tremendous increase at the pump.”

Carson’s legislation received wide support from environmental groups and union labor. Joe Walsh, business manager for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 99, speaking in support of the bill, said costs for gas and heating oil were costing workers much more.

“A bucketful of wind or a truckload of sunshine costs the same amount as it did two months ago,” Walsh said. “This bill offers a lot of different options to help us get to a clean energy goal under the Act on Climate.”