A draft version of MISO’s 2022 Annual Transmission Plan (MTEP 22) calls for $3.8 billion in spending for 364 of the footprint’s new transmission projects, a $500 million increase over a February draft. (See Initial MTEP22 Portfolio has $3.3B in Costs.)

During a series of subregional planning meetings last week, stakeholders learned MTEP 22’s $3.8 billion value is an increase over the $3 billion MTEP 21 portfolio, which had 335 projects.

MTEP 22 contains about $1.5 billion earmarked for projects addressing aging existing infrastructure, $1 billion for projects accommodating load growth, $580 million in necessary baseline reliability projects to meet NERC standards, another $530 million in projects to solve more garden variety reliability issues and nearly $250 million in projects to interconnect new generation.

MISO South has been assigned 30 projects, valued at $810 million. Six of the 10 most expensive projects are located in the region. The projects, submitted by Entergy’s Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas subsidiary to meet load growth, range in price from almost $96 million to $50 million.

The most expensive MTEP 22 project is Duke Energy’s $100 million addition of a West Lafayette, Ind., substation, also driven by growing load.

During a Central Subregional Planning meeting Wednesday, MISO’s senior manager of transmission expansion planning, Thompson Adu, said the RTO is currently “resource constrained” on MTEP planning work because it continues to simultaneously plan the long-range transmission portfolios. (See MISO Makes Business Case on Long-range Tx Plan.)

The grid operator will hold another series of subregional planning meetings in early September to lay out the final MTEP 22 report. MISO’s Board of Directors will consider the portfolio’s approval in December.