The Energy Department on Thursday announced an investment of $1.5 billion in electricity grid expansion projects it said will improve reliability and relieve transmission congestion.
The money, supplied through the Transmission Facilitation Program, will go toward the construction of an estimated 1,000 miles of new transmission lines with 7,100 megawatts of added capacity across six states. This will result in 9,000 construction jobs and 350 permanent jobs, the Biden administration said.
Deputy Energy Secretary David Turk said on a call with reporters that through the TFP, which is funded through the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law, the department “buys capacity on the line and then sells it when new customers show up.” The program is authorized to use capacity contracts, loans or public-private partnerships to provide federal support for large-scale transmission lines, but the Biden administration has only opted for capacity contracts to date.
The recipients, who will now enter into capacity contract negotiations with the Energy Department, are:
- Avangrid Networks Inc.’s Aroostook Renewable Project, which would bring wind-generated electricity from northern Maine to the rest of New England.
- Cimarron Link Transmission LLC, which would construct capacity to carry wind- and solar-generated electricity from rural Oklahoma to Tulsa.
- Southern Spirit Transmission LLC, which would construct bidirectional capacity across Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi.
- Southline Transmission LLC, which would construct Phase 2 of a project connecting wind- and solar-generated energy to Las Cruces, N.M.
Phase 1 of the Southline project in Arizona was funded through the first round of Transmission Facilitation Program funding last year, along with projects covering Nevada, Utah, New Hampshire and Vermont. Turk said that these projects have all signed capacity contracts with the department.
National climate adviser Ali Zaidi said the program helps reduce “the market risk associated with building this critical infrastructure.”
Also on Thursday the Energy Department released the final National Transmission Planning Study, which includes planning tools and analyses of potential scenarios through 2050, focusing on ways to increase reliability and resilience.
The study found that the U.S. will need to approximately double to triple the 2020 transmission capacity by 2050 to meet demands and reliability needs, a figure in line with previous estimates. It also estimated that a substantial expansion could lead to electricity system cost savings of $270 billion to $490 billion through the same year.
Senior adviser for international climate policy John Podesta cited the importance of better interregional planning, as well as the need to “cut through red tape” to meet that goal.
“Historically, the permitting process for clean energy infrastructure, particularly transmission, has been plagued by delays and bottlenecks at every level, federal, state and local,” Podesta said.
He noted there has been progress, including amendments to the National Environmental Policy Act in the 2023 agreement to raise the debt ceiling. However, Republicans in Congress have strongly objected to the administration’s rulemaking in response to that law, arguing it ignores the agreement’s intent.
A bill introduced by Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chairman Joe Manchin III, I-W.Va., and ranking member John Barrasso, R-Wyo., includes provisions intended to facilitate greater interregional transmission, a topic expected to resurface in the lame-duck session after the elections.
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