PJM will seek stakeholders’ input on ways to encourage interconnection customers to file their requests earlier, officials told the Planning Committee last week.

A more granular review of PJM’s interconnection queue over the past 14 years indicates that about 80% of requests are for new generation projects, and that 15% of those are now in service. Proposals for upgrades had a 58% success rate, said David Egan, manager of interconnection projects.

The review, which excluded active projects, looked at queues A through AA1 since 2000, when the queuing process began.

The review was sparked by last month’s queue status update, which showed that PJM’s new graduated queue-entry cost structure had failed to persuade developers to file applications earlier. (See PJM: Interconnection Customers Still Procrastinating.)

Under the new structure, the deposit for applications filed in the first four months was set at $10,000; for the fifth month it was set at $20,000; and for the last month, $30,000. Despite the cost increases, most developers waited until the last days to file, leading to an uneven work load for project managers.

“We’re not jumping to any immediate changes but will be coming back with further discussion,” said Steve Herling, vice president of planning. “We’ll be coming up with a problem statement. We now have a much more complete picture of these queues.”

The 2,394 project applications in the queues represent 289,742 MW, according to Egan. Of those, 30,546 MW (11%) are in-service and 16,360 MW were withdrawn.