Casten Introduces Bill to Expand Benefits of Local Transmission Lines
Washington, D.C. — U.S. Congressman Sean Casten (IL-06) introduced the Integrated Local, Regional, and Interregional Transmission Planning Act, legislation that will make electricity more affordable, reliable, resilient, and clean by helping to make best use of key local transmission facilities in the expansion of regional and interregional transmission capacity. Well-planned transmission broadens the pool of electricity generation resources available to customers, increasing access to less expensive electricity – which tends as well to be the cleanest energy.
“Ensuring that local transmission facilities are considered in regional and interregional transmission planning is vital in creating lower-cost new transmission capabilities,” said Rep. Sean Casten. “The current transmission planning process can be inefficiently narrow in scope. At a time when our electric grid is under tremendous stress, the Integrated Local, Regional, and Interregional Transmission Planning Act offers a fix that can make our grid more efficient, reliable, and resilient, while expanding access to affordable clean energy.”
Claire Wayner and Chaz Teplin of RMI, authors of the landmark 2024 report, “Mind the Regulatory Gap,” said, “We applaud the introduction of the Integrated Local, Regional, and Interregional Transmission Planning Act. The Act will help close the regulatory gap by incorporating local transmission projects into regional and interregional transmission planning. This will maximize benefits for ratepayers by reducing overall system costs and maximizing planning and market efficiencies.”
Talia Calnek-Sugin, Senior Energy Policy Advocate at NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council), said, “Right now, transmission planning is done in a disjointed way that produces a less robust grid at a higher cost for Americans. The Integrated Local, Regional, and Interregional Transmission Planning Act would harmonize these fragmented and incomplete planning processes and deliver consumers lower electric bills, clean and affordable energy, and a more reliable power grid.”
Under the Integrated Local, Regional, and Interregional Transmission Planning Act, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) will require transmission planning regions to integrate and improve their planning processes for interregional, regional, and certain local transmission facilities, the latter being those which could be useful, if replaced, for regional or interregional transmission.
The legislation focuses on local transmission facilities for two reasons. First, some existing local transmission lines can be upsized to provide lower-cost regional and interregional transmission, avoiding the need to build new transmission lines.
Second, local transmission projects often inhabit a "regulatory gap” – state overseers are prohibited from objecting to the projects on economic grounds even as they are given a weighty presumption of prudence at the federal level. When transmitting utilities address just their local needs without considering possible regional and interregional benefits, these local transmission investments may foreclose better regional and interregional projects.
Specifically, the Integrated Local, Regional, and Interregional Transmission Planning Act builds on FERC Order 1920 by requiring FERC to issue a regulation that would require transmission planning regions (excluding the Electric Reliability Council of Texas) to:
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Integrate interregional, regional, and covered local transmission planning processes;
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Advance transmission solutions that are more efficient or cost-effective in the long term to replace the need for less efficient short-term solutions;
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Use scenarios of 20 years or more that include a range of factors, including State-approved integrated resource plans; Federal, Tribal, state and local requirements and policy goals; and trends in the costs of fuels, generation and electric storage;
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Account for transmission outages due to extreme weather events;
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Optimize the existing transmission system, including through grid-enhancing technologies;
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Establish cost allocation methodologies applicable to projects selected in their transmission plans, while allowing customers to be charged only for those facilities from which they benefit; and
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Develop joint plans with any neighboring Regional Transmission Organizations (RTO) and Independent System Operators (ISO).
The original cosponsors of the bill are U.S. Representatives Kathy Castor (FL-14), Mike Levin (CA-49), George Latimer (NY-16), and James McGovern (MA-02).
A summary of the legislation can be found here.
Text of the legislation can be found here.
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