A group of former FERC chairs during a virtual panel discussion on Wednesday said the commission should issue new transmission planning rules to help decarbonize the U.S. and provide resilience and energy security.

Pointing to the success of previous landmark FERC orders, the former chairs said that while the specifics of what new rules might look like are not clear, the reasons for them are.

Former Chair Elizabeth Moler told the panel that she is proud of helping launch open transmission access with Order 888, but the transmission system has “changed dramatically in the intervening 25 years.”

FERC, she said, “should take the steps necessary to facilitate more access for new actors, new players, new types of resources, and interregional transmission, and encourage further development of an even more robust interdependent and new generation of power supply.”

The panel was hosted by Americans for a Clean Energy Grid (ACEG) for the release of its new report, “Planning for the Future: FERC’s Opportunity to Spur More Cost-Effective Transmission Infrastructure.” The report calls for FERC to issue a new rulemaking to reform planning, cost allocation and review of transmission in a manner that will support more regional and interregional power exchange for national energy security, reliability, resilience, cost-effectiveness and economic competitiveness.

“A decade after Order No. 1000’s issuance, the nation faces new challenges, and it is clear that neither the current infrastructure nor the rules governing its development match this need,” the report said.

The report supplements ACEG’s Jan. 12 report that alleged RTO policies assigning most costs of large network upgrades to interconnection customers violate FERC’s “beneficiary pays” principle and are no longer just and reasonable. (See ‘Participant Funding’ Violates FPA, Grid Groups Say.)

As part of the report, ACEG makes sweeping recommendations for how FERC could move forward with the rulemaking, but panel members did not specifically endorse the policy details of the report.

They were, however, generally supportive of the idea that proactive planning of regional and interregional transmission infrastructure is necessary in the near term.

“I believe [the grid] will need to double in size to accommodate electrification, transportation, heat and other industrial processes,” said former Chair James Hoecker, who formerly headed the transmission trade organization WIRES. “Even taking into account [distributed generation] and energy efficiency, the doubling of electricity from wind and solar between now and 2035 augurs very strongly for major expansion of the grid.”

Building on Success

Greg Wetstone, CEO of the American Council on Renewable Energy, also joined the panel discussion, saying that there has been no interregional transmission development using the Order 1000 process.

“I’m hopeful [FERC] will be able to address these issues with a new rule that will help modernize and expand our outdated and congested power grid,” Wetstone said.

The failure to bring new interregional transmission to development isn’t for a lack of trying. MISO and SPP, for example, have gone through four coordinated system plan studies. In their most recent study last year, the RTOs ran into discrepancies over cost estimates, and ultimately were unable to identify any beneficial cross-border projects. (See 4th Time No Charm for MISO-SPP Interregional Study.)

Former FERC Commissioner Nora Brownell said inconsistency between and among regions makes it difficult to make decisions in the planning process. She said that the industry has better data now than it had when she was at FERC in the early 2000s, and it could be better applied to planning.

“I’d love to see FERC not only broaden the data set by encouraging new transmission technologies but also working with [the U.S. Department of Energy] to analyze data to make sure that we are being consistent in how we apply things,” she said.

The ACEG report offers suggestions for how to build on the success of FERC Orders 888, 2000, 890 and 1000, allowing for the lessons learned from their implementation to expand development of “region-spanning and interregional transmission capacity,” with an eye toward cost effectiveness.

In the report, the vision for a new planning process takes shape under four suggestions.

• • • Best Available Data: Planning processes would use the best available data and forecasting methodologies to ensure projects address future needs and scenarios. Planning entities would have to evaluate needs based on a range of factors that could influence long-term power demands and the resource mix.
    • Consider Benefits Together: Planning authorities would need to consider all the benefits of transmission together to avoid a siloed approach. The report says classifications of projects by reliability, public policy or economic status can overlook their multiple benefits.
    • Evaluate All Solutions: Transmission planning entities would be directed to evaluate all available solutions — including new physical infrastructure options and grid-enhancing technologies — within regional transmission plans. This approach, the report said, ensures that lower cost or better performing options are included in planning.
    • Plan with Portfolios: Transmission planning entities would select a portfolio of solutions for each regional and interregional transmission plan that is likely to maximize aggregate net benefits. The report said that FERC should encourage innovations to ensure accurate quantifications of transmission-related benefits to support portfolio planning.