MISO executives last week said an evolving energy industry heralds big spending on transmission projects in the RTO’s footprint.

Vice President of System Planning Jennifer Curran borrowed a line from CEO John Bear when she told the MISO Board of Directors, “If you love renewables, you better love transmission.”

“And that’s very true,” she said during the board’s System Planning Committee on Dec. 7, noting that transmission is key to linking renewable sources with load centers.

The grid operator announced in July that it will begin a long-term transmission planning effort, driven by an accelerating fleet transition as customer preferences, decarbonization goals and economics converge. MISO has said its members’ decarbonization and renewable goals are dependent on it “addressing rapidly worsening deliverability.”

Curran said an increase in renewables and a waning reliance on coal Is driving the long-term planning effort.

“When we see fossil plants retire, they’re often replaced with resources such as wind and solar,” she said.

MISO’s most conservative 20-year planning future now calls for three times as many renewable resources than planned by the grid operator’s last long-term effort, the 2011 Multi-Value Project (MVP) portfolio. Even then, stakeholders said the future’s projection of 60 GW of additional renewable resources is too conservative.

MISO executives repeatedly warned during December’s Board Week that a long-term transmission buildout could reach several billion dollars.

“We have a big challenge in front of us,” Curran said, noting that the price tag for all the transmission “will be significant.”

But she said many landowners still don’t want new transmission towers erected near their property.

“There’s a lot of resistance to new right-of-way,” she added.

Curran said MISO is looking for ways to best leverage its existing transmission right-of-way to help “speed things up.”

She also said that cost-allocation decisions loom as a potential stumbling block.

“We’re going to be talking about different drivers for transmission than we have in the past,” she said, adding that while the footprint’s jurisdictions and utilities are moving toward clean energy, it’s not being done at the same pace. That leads to a variable value placed on transmission accessing renewable generation.

Curran said MISO’s order of business in 2021 is to use its most conservative 20-year future planning scenario to create an early transmission map of possible projects. She said some project ideas may have stronger business cases and will be able to proceed as early as the RTO’s 2021 expansion plan (MTEP 21).

MISO already has “corridors of need” in mind, Curran said. She added that the interconnection queue’s “heavy activity” in MISO West can identify areas of potential transmission build-out.

Director Mark Johnson asked if FERC’s push for dynamic transmission line ratings would diminish the scope or number of necessary projects.

“Ambient-adjusted ratings would only have a very little — if minimal — impact on the long-range transmission perspective,” Curran said. She said while dynamic ratings would be useful in real-time, it wouldn’t replace the need for transmission projects.

MISO Director of Operations Planning J.T. Smith said planners predict a 5 or 6% transmission capability increase in the system with dynamic line ratings.

However, MISO Independent Market Monitor David Patton said his analysis indicated a 10% increase in capability.

“We’ve been on what can only be described as a campaign or crusade for this for the past two to three years,” Patton said, referencing his monitoring staff. “This is not something that is new. ERCOT already does this, [as do transmission owners] outside of RTOs.”

1st SATA Project Gains Approval

The board unanimously approved American Transmission Co.’s energy storage project in central Wisconsin, originally part of the MTEP 19 assessment, that is poised to fend off reliability issues.

The $8 million, 2.5 MW/5 MWh battery project, MISO’s first storage-as-transmission project, has been on hold because the RTO didn’t have FERC approval to govern the project’s operation. FERC in early August approved MISO’s ruleset, paving the way for its operation. It is expected to be in service by the end of 2021. (See FERC Greenlights MISO Storage-as-Tx Proposal.)

Aubrey Johnson, ‎MISO’s executive director of system planning, said staff considered stakeholder concerns that their analysis didn’t go far enough in studying alternatives to the battery project.

“MISO’s analysis shows that this project is the most cost-effective solution,” he said. Johnson said in this case, a wires solution to solve the potential voltage, thermal and instability concerns would have taken longer to construct and been more expensive.

Director Phyllis Currie asked whether MISO expects to see more storage-as-transmission projects. Johnson said while the grid operator expects to see more projects, he doesn’t expect them to become commonplace.

“It really is a narrow slice of application. I don’t think we’ll see a ton of them, but we’ll see more,” he predicted.

The board also unanimously approved the $4 billion, 514-project MTEP 20 portfolio. (See MTEP 20 Passes 1st Board Endorsement.)

One MVP Left

MISO is down to one unfinished project of its last long-term transmission planning effort, 2011’s MVP portfolio.

Ameren’s last segment of the $408 million, 345-kV Pana-Faraday-Kansas-Sugar Creek line in Illinois and Indiana was energized this week, leaving only the embattled Cardinal Hickory Creek line to be built.

Conservation groups Wisconsin Wildlife Federation and Driftless Area Land Conservancy continue to fight Cardinal Hickory Creek’s construction in court, alleging Wisconsin Public Service Commission Chair Rebecca Valcq and former Commissioner Mike Huebsch had perceived conflicts of interest when they voted to permit the line.

The Conservancy argued that Valcq should have recused herself because she previously worked for WEC Energy Group, the parent company of line developer American Transmission Co., and that Huebsch, as a member of the Organization of MISO States, should have recused himself because he had communications with MISO. The group argued Huebsch also improperly applied to be CEO of Dairyland Power Cooperative, a minority owner of the line, after he left the commission in February.

MISO expects Cardinal Hickory Creek to be in service by 2023.

The 17-project MVP portfolio’s cost has grown from its originally estimated $5.6 billion to $6.6 billion.

“That just struck me as a really big number,” MISO Director Todd Raba said of the increase.

Johnson said inflation alone brings the original planning-level estimate to $5.8 billion. The remaining increases were caused by regulatory decisions, route changes, engineering and design changes, and the climbing price of materials.

“There is increased focus on making sure estimates are better,” Johnson added.