FERC Could Soon Be Building a Transmission Line to the Future
| Author | David P. Clarke |
| Position | Writer and editor who has served as a journalist, in industry, and in government |
| Pages | 9-9 |
SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2021 | 9
Reprinted by permission from The Environmental Forum®, September/October 2021.
Copyright © 2021, Environmental Law Institute®, Washington, D.C. www.eli.org.
The Federal Beat
FOR the rst time in over a
decade, Federal Energy Regula-
tory Commission members have
taken a step toward a reform initia-
tive that could produce far-reaching
changes in how the United States
plans and pays for national electric
transmission lines. ese are needed
to connect rapidly proliferating but
remotely located wind and solar in-
stallations to major population cen-
ters and energy consumers.
In a July 15 advance notice of
proposed rulemaking, FERC called
for public comments on a “more for-
ward-looking approach” to building
the transmission system of the fu-
ture,” a system that will be indispens-
able for meeting the Biden adminis-
tration’s goal of a carbon-free power
sector by 2035 and an economy with
net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by
2050.
Commenting on the announce-
ment, FERC Chair Rich Glick under-
scored that a “piecemeal approach to
expanding the transmission system is
not going to get the
job done,” at least
not eciently and in
a way that results in
“just and reasonable”
rates and is not “un-
duly discriminatory
or preferential.”
Today’s transmission planning
and cost-allocation are traditionally
piecemeal, reactive, and blind to the
ineluctably emerging future resource
mix, with planners only making in-
cremental upgrades necessary to inter-
connect individual generators’ plants,
says Rob Gramlich, executive direc-
tor of Americans for a Clean Energy
Grid, a leading coalition advocating
modernization. FERC’s Federal Pow-
er Act mission is to ensure just and
reasonable rates, and that, perforce,
means future planning that accounts
for the emerging mix of new electric-
ity generation sources that “everybody
in the industry recognizes” is coming,
Gramlich says.
Lending support for better plan-
ning, in June the Department of
Energy’s National Renewable Energy
Laboratory issued a multiyear “renew-
able integration” analysis that con-
cluded more cooperation among re-
gions with dierent energy resources
could provide up to $180 billion in
net benets, with transmission play-
ing “an important role in minimizing
costs.”
FERC’s rulemaking announce-
ment indicates that the independent
agency may pursue a nationwide,
comprehensive transmission reform,
“exactly what we’re hoping for,” says
Gramlich. In January, his coalition
released a report titled “Planning for
the Future.” Its calls for comprehen-
sive reform received strong support
from a bipartisan group of nine for-
mer FERC commissioners. If FERC
implements the anticipated reforms,
it would be “probably the most sig-
nicant action any policymaker could
take nationally for
clean energy,” Gram-
lich adds.
By extension, new
transmission linking
clean energy would
be the cornerstone
for a national GHG-
reduction strategy that will require
electrifying transportation, buildings,
and in time industrial manufacturing.
But while the call for climate action
is increasingly urgent, transmission
reform will take a while. An advance
notice could take up to six months,
and the actual notice of a proposed
rulemaking the same. at needs to
be followed up by regional implemen-
tation. In June, however, FERC and
the National Association of Regulato-
ry Utility Commissioners, represent-
ing state regulators, announced the
establishment of a joint federal-state
task force on electric transmission.
So FERC is already taking steps to
engage essential state partners to co-
operatively identify policy and other
barriers inhibiting transmission devel-
opment.
FERC’s advance notice of a pro-
posed rulemaking comes as high-level
policymakers recognize the importance
of large-scale transmission both for
grid resilience and climate mitigation.
e Energy Infrastructure Act, for ex-
ample, passed 13-7 on July 14 by the
Senate Energy and Natural Resources
Committee, directs FERC to x trans-
mission planning and provides a small
but helpful $2.5 billion grid loan pro-
gram. e House CLEAN Future Act
contains provisions supporting grid
modernization and establishing a na-
tional policy aimed at overcoming bar-
riers to transmission investments. And
the Biden infrastructure plan calls for
building thousands of miles of new
transmission to facilitate renewable en-
ergy expansion.
Notwithstanding the growing calls
for new transmission policies and cli-
mate action more broadly, Congress
remains deeply divided, so “we have
to be practical and realistic” about
the potential for legislation, Gramlich
cautions. Still, FERC has “very strong
authority” to act on transmission plan-
ning and “it’s looking like they will.”
In addition, the departments of En-
ergy, Transportation, and Interior can
use their limited authorities to help
move transmission projects forward,
with targeted congressional directives
helping to remove some barriers.
FERC Could Soon Be Building a
Transmission Line to the Future
Conceivably the most
action possible for
pushing clean energy
David P. Clarke is a writer and
editor who ha s served as a journa list,
in industr y, and in government. Emai l
him at davidpaulclarke@gmail.com.
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