Eversource Energy

What does Eversource Energy own?

It owns regulated electric transmission and distribution utilities and natural gas distribution utilities serving Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire. Subsidiaries include Connecticut Light and Power, NSTAR Electric, Public Service Company of New Hampshire, Western Massachusetts Electric, NSTAR Gas, and Yankee Gas. It sold its water utility, Aquarion, in June 2026.

Is Eversource Energy publicly traded?

Yes. Eversource trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker ES and is a member of the S&P 500. Shares are broadly held by institutional investors, and no controlling owner exists.

Who founded Eversource Energy?

The company is a merged entity rather than a founder-driven business. Its predecessor, Northeast Utilities, formed in 1966 by combining Connecticut Light and Power, Western Massachusetts Electric, and Holyoke Water Power. The Eversource name dates to the 2015 rebrand.

Where is Eversource Energy headquartered?

Eversource Energy is headquartered in Hartford, Connecticut, USA. It also maintains major operations centers in Boston, Massachusetts, and Springfield, Massachusetts, reflecting its three-state service territory.

How many brands does Eversource Energy own?

Effectively one. All customer-facing service operates under the Eversource brand, while legacy names like CL&P and NSTAR remain as subsidiary legal names. Aquarion Water was sold to a public authority in June 2026.

Who owns Eversource Energy?

Public shareholders own Eversource. Institutional investors hold most of the outstanding shares, and there is no controlling family, founder, or government owner. Joseph Nolan serves as chairman, president, and chief executive officer.

The oldest predecessor utilities date to the early 1900s, but the corporate entity began in 1966 when Connecticut Light and Power, Western Massachusetts Electric, and Holyoke Water Power combined under a holding company called Northeast Utilities. The structure let three regulated utilities share financing and management while keeping separate service territories.

Northeast Utilities spent the following decades consolidating. It added Public Service Company of New Hampshire in 1992 after that utility's bankruptcy, an event tied to the troubled Seabrook nuclear plant. Through the 1990s and 2000s the company remained a steady, mid-size regulated utility while the industry around it chased deregulation and merchant power.

Two strategic turns reshaped the company. First, a 1997 agreement, completed in stages, to divest most of its fossil and hydro generation, leaving the company focused on transmission and distribution. Second, the 2012 merger with NSTAR, a Boston-area electric and gas utility, in a roughly $4.3 billion deal billed as a merger of equals. The combination made Northeast Utilities the largest energy delivery company in New England.

The retail brand problem came next. Customers in the three states knew the company as CL&P, NSTAR, or PSNH, not as Northeast Utilities. In 2015 the company renamed itself Eversource Energy and unified its operating companies under the single Eversource name, one of the larger utility rebrands in U.S. history.

The company then made a bet that did not hold. Starting in 2016 Eversource partnered with Orsted to develop offshore wind projects off the northeast coast, investing billions in South Fork Wind and Revolution Wind. Costs ballooned and interest rates rose. In 2024 Eversource exited, completing the sale of its 50 percent stakes to Global Infrastructure Partners on September 30, 2024, and absorbing multi-hundred-million-dollar after-tax losses. The same year it moved to sell Aquarion Water, acquired in 2017 for $1.68 billion, to refocus on electric and gas. That sale cleared regulators in March 2026 and closed June 30, 2026.

Joseph R. Nolan Jr., a longtime company executive, has served as president and chief executive officer since 2021 and also holds the chairman title.

Eversource has attracted sustained political and regulatory scrutiny in its home states. Connecticut Attorney General William Tong and municipal leaders opposed the Aquarion sale throughout 2025 and 2026, arguing the deal would raise water bills and remove state oversight. PURA initially voted to block the sale in November 2025; a Superior Court judge overturned that denial in January 2026, and PURA approved the transaction on remand in March 2026. The sale closed June 30, 2026 with a pledge of no rate increase for the remainder of that year.

Earlier, the company's Northern Pass transmission project, a planned 192-mile line carrying Canadian hydropower through New Hampshire, was rejected by New Hampshire regulators in 2018 after years of local opposition and was abandoned.

Rate increases are a recurring friction point. Eversource has faced criticism from consumer advocates and Connecticut officials over delivery charges, and the offshore wind writedowns of 2023 and 2024, totaling more than $800 million after tax, drew shareholder lawsuits alleging inadequate disclosure. The company has defended the disclosures and continues to contest the claims.