Kansas regulators on Tuesday granted a certificate of convenience and necessity to NextEra Energy Transmission (NEET) Southwest as it seeks to build a transmission line it was awarded last year through SPP’s competitive process.
The Kansas Corporation Commission said in its decision the project “will have a beneficial effect on customers by lowering overall energy costs, removing inefficiency, relieving transmission congestion, and improving the reliability of the transmission system” (22-NETE-419-COC).
NEET Southwest estimates it will cost $85.2 million to build the 94-mile, 345-kV transmission line from the Wolf Creek nuclear power plant in Kansas to the Blackberry substation in Missouri. The project has a 2025 completion date.
Commission staff said the project is expected to produce a benefit-to-cost ratio of between 3.36 and 1.48 to 1.24, but that was based on an early estimate of $162.7 million in construction costs.
“This leads the Commission to believe the [B/C] ratio is much higher than originally projected,” the KCC said.
Under the terms of a nonunanimous settlement agreement among NextEra and KCC staff, Evergy, SPP, Kansas Electric Power Cooperative, Sunflower Electric Power and Citizens’ Utility Ratepayer Board, NEET Southwest will consider an option to double circuit a 25-mile segment that parallels an existing Evergy 161-kV transmission line. That is subject to receiving approval from SPP for a change in project scope and agreements from Evergy.
The KCC directed NEET Southwest to cooperate with Evergy, the incumbent transmission provider, to interconnect the transmission line to the Wolf Creek substation.
SPP’s Board of Directors approved NEET Southwest’s bid for the project last October. It is one of four competitive projects the grid operator has signed off on under FERC Order 1000. (See “Expert Panel Awards Competitive Project to NextEra Energy Transmission,” SPP Board of Directors/Members Committee Briefs: Oct. 26, 2021.)
In February, FERC approved NEET Southwest’s request to recover 100% of all prudently incurred costs associated with the project should it be abandoned or canceled for reasons beyond the company’s control. (See NextEra Transmission Subsidiary Gains Abandonment Approval.)
