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November 5, 2024

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MISO Puts Finishing Touches on $10B Tx Plan, Hunts New Projects

MISO’s $10.3 billion long-range transmission plan (LRTP) inched closer to approval Thursday as some board members advanced the project portfolio to the full board for its consideration later this month.

The Board of Directors’ System Planning Committee voted unanimously during a special conference call to recommend the full board take up the package’s approval in late July.

The first of four LRTP portfolios contains 18 345-kV projects in MISO Midwest. The portfolio is considered an addendum to the RTO’s 2021 Transmission Expansion Plan (MTEP).

“The portfolio shift is well underway,” Aubrey Johnson, vice president of system planning and competitive transmission, said during the call. “The future energy mix requires a broad and holistic solution rather than the type of approach we typically use with our annual MTEPs.”  

Over the next 20 years, MISO conservatively expects 58 GW of mostly coal and gas resource retirements and about 90 GW of new gas and renewable resources, lowering the footprint’s carbon emissions down 63% from 2005 levels.

Director Nancy Lange asked how long it will take for the projects to become “regulatory realities.” Johnson said it should take about six to 18 months for the lines to gain state regulatory approval.

Johnson said his team will begin to prepare requests for proposals where state rights-of-first-refusal (ROFR) don’t prohibit competitive bidding. In states with ROFR laws, incumbent transmission developers will need to seek construction approval from their respective regulatory bodies.

MISO estimates that just $1 billion of the portfolio will ultimately be open to competition. The grid operator said nearly $4 billion worth of the projects are considered upgrades to existing facilities, while another $5.5 billion worth of projects are in states with ROFR legislation. Michigan, Minnesota, Iowa and the Dakotas all have ROFR laws; Wisconsin lawmakers have considered one but haven’t passed it.

Johnson said the RTO will likely manage multiple requests for proposals on the LRTP projects that can be competitively bid. “This will be the largest solicitation we’ve ever done,” he said at an earlier System Planning Committee meeting.

At the same meeting, Senior Vice President of Planning and Operations Jennifer Curran said the projects are based on a two-year-old “haircut” of MISO members’ resource planning. She said the projects are the product of a conservative future view and are crucial for reliability.

MISO’s sectors voted earlier in June to recommend the LRTP portfolio to the board. None of the 11 sectors opposed the transmission buildout; two abstained and the power marketers and end-use customers did not participate in the vote. (See MISO Makes Business Case on Long-range Tx Plan.)

MISO is also preparing for the LRTP’s second phase. The next round of projects will again be in the Midwest, much to some stakeholders’ frustration. It’s not until the third phase that the RTO will turn its attention to MISO South’s needs.

The grid operator will update its three, 20-year planning futures for its second collection of long-range projects. Johnson said a lot has changed since MISO last updated its futures in 2020.

Johnson said should the board approve the first LRTP portfolio, staff will provide “regulatory support” for state regulators on the first set of projects while beginning the hunt for the second portfolio’s projects.

“In many ways, we’re just getting started,” Johnson said.

Curran said MISO planners are expecting to defend the projects in front of state commissions. “We feel comfortable and confident that we’ve put together a strong case,” Curran said.

To shorten construction timelines and ensure simpler regulatory processes, the first LRTP cycle made use of existing rights of way. However, during a June 3 Entergy Regional State Committee Working Group meeting, MISO Senior Director of Transmission Planning Laura Rauch said the RTO isn’t sure it will take a similar approach in the South because there are benefits to “geographic diversity” of transmission lines in hurricane-prone areas.

Andy Kowalczyk, with the 350 New Orleans activist group, said MISO might consider building lines that could serve as alternative pathways to restore power in a post-hurricane blackout.

“How we get load back on is going to be critical,” Rauch agreed.

Rauch said strategically placed transmission can lessen the amount of generation states must build. “Transmission lets you optimize the generation you’re building,” he said.

Texas Public Utility Commission economist Werner Roth said MISO might want to emphasize reliability over economic benefits to better make its cases in front of state commissions.

Rauch said MISO agrees and said playing up economic benefits works because dollars are motivating.

Simon Mahan, executive director of the Southern Renewable Energy Association, said though MISO is likely understating economic benefits, stressing the reliability component will likely be the piece that “gets everyone on board” in MISO South.

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SACE Says Southeastern US Unprepared to Decarbonize

None of the major utilities in the Southeastern U.S. are on track to decarbonize by midcentury or even by 2070, according to the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy’s (SACE) fourth annual decarbonization tracking report.

The alliance said that based on the current rate of change, Duke Energy won’t reach net-zero emissions until the next century. It said the Tennessee Valley Authority won’t achieve the emissions target until 2088, with Southern Company, Dominion SC and Next Era Energy decarbonizing in the early 2070s, the report said.

Although all five major utilities have announced net-zero emissions goals, only Duke and Next Era have expressed them in their integrated resource plans.

SACE emissions forecast (SACE) Content.jpgSACE emissions forecast of Southeastern utilities | SACE

 

SACE said Southeastern utilities will decarbonize more slowly from 2020 to 2030 than they did from 2010 to 2020.

“This is because utilities are seeing fewer and fewer emissions reductions from replacing coal generation with fossil gas,” SACE said in the report. “Fossil gas has been the dominant fuel in the region for several years, so utilities looking to decarbonize at the pace seen in the 2010s must continue to retire remaining coal plants at a steady pace and replace fossil gas and remaining coal with clean, zero-carbon energy sources like wind, solar, storage and energy efficiency.”

The organization said that current utility resource plans in the region indicate total CO2 emissions will decrease only 15% from current levels by 2030. SACE said utilities would need to cut emissions by 67% by 2030 to help limit climate warming to 1.5°C. That would cut about 105 million tons of carbon emissions annually by 2030, it said.

SACE also warned that “some utilities may see increased emissions in the next few years as high fossil gas prices mean utilities may decide to burn more coal.”

“If utilities had acted sooner, wind, solar and storage projects would have already been underway, avoiding some of this impact,” the alliance said.

SACE said wind and solar generation and energy efficiency measures accounted for 6% of the Southeast’s resource mix in 2020. Solar generation will account for all renewable energy’s gain when it comprises 13% of the mix by 2030.

The report found that the region’s total annual CO2 emissions have dropped about 20% from their peak in 2005, driven mostly by a 35 to 40% reduction in carbon emissions from the electricity industry.

The group said it foresees a troubling increased reliance on natural gas generation in the Southeast. It also said based on Duke Energy and TVA’s announced plans, the last coal units in the region would retire in the 2030-2035 timeframe.

SACE said the Southeast is positioned “first and worst” for climate impacts.

“The Southeast is home to many frontline communities that are already being negatively affected by fossil fuels and the climate crisis. Stronger and more frequent extreme weather events, coastal flooding, poor air quality and unpredictable energy prices are likely to continue to harm our communities,” the organization wrote.

SACE said the region’s decarbonization could pick up if more people become interested in utilities’ integrated resource planning.

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Mass. AG Weighs in on Capacity Accreditation with Brattle Report

A new report from the Brattle Group, commissioned by the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office, has weighed in with recommendations for capacity accreditation as ISO-NE and NEPOOL are starting down the path of revamping how they value the contributions of energy resources.

ISO-NE first presented an outline in early June for how it plans to tackle capacity accreditation, starting what will be a yearlong stakeholder process on a significant change to the capacity market. (See ISO-NE Starts its Capacity Accreditation Journey.)

There will be opinions galore on the process, but the new report from the AG’s office is an early and potentially influential one.

The report looks at a number of methodologies for capacity accreditation to replace the region’s current Installed Capacity (ICAP) system, and lands on recommending what Brattle calls a “Hybrid Marginal Reliability Value based on Modeling and Empiricism.”

That option would rely on both historical measurements of resources’ performance and advanced reliability modeling, the report says, and tailor the specifics to New England’s needs and the characteristics of different resources. For example, for resources like wind and solar without batteries, the hybrid system could simulate their performance for an initial estimate, and then use historical measurements to get more specific about how the resources differ from the average of their class.

Accrediting other resources could rely primarily on historical data but also use model-based adjustments to account for outside factors like limitations on fuel. For each type of resource, the report acknowledges, “determining the best hybrid approaches to accreditation will require extensive development and calibration.”

Brattle makes a number of recommendations for while ISO-NE is developing its new approach. For example, the report calls for immediately upgrading accreditation for thermal resources, and not waiting for the full process to be complete. 

“We suspect that thermal resources lacking firm fuel backup are the resources whose capacity ratings are most substantially overstated by current ICAP-based accounting methods in New England and therefore pose the most immediate reliability concern,” it says. Delaying application of a marginal value concept to these resources, while rushing it for others, “risks exacerbating present reliability concerns by amplifying economic incentives for resources with the most overstated capacity ratings.”

The report also recommends that ISO-NE improve its reliability modeling and implement seasonal accounting of reliability needs.

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Dragos Pushes Communication Skills for Cyber Professionals

Awareness of the rapidly developing cybersecurity threat landscape is rising among North American corporate leaders, members of the management team at cybersecurity firm Dragos said in a webinar last week.

But the importance of protecting operational technology assets and industrial control systems (ICS) is still far behind where it should be, at least according to attendees’ anecdotal experiences.

“When I look at my services team, 90% of our engagements … in the manufacturing sector particularly, have weak or zero perimeter control from their corporate to their OT environments,” Ben Miller, vice president of services at Dragos, said in the OT Cybersecurity Strategies webinar. “That’s combined with [the fact that] 60% of shared credentials are used between corporate and OT [environments] … and nearly all of [our engagements] lack an OT-capable visibility into what is occurring within those environments.”

Miller said that, in his experience, company leadership and board members tend to see “data breach and data loss as the significant risk on the technology side,” while protection of OT systems is usually a lower priority. Dragos’ Chief Information Security Officer Steve Applegate, whose background includes advising on NERC’s Critical Infrastructure Protection standards, attributed this disparity to the typical background of management team members. He said that a large part of his goal when speaking to corporate clients is simply overcoming this divide between business-oriented and technology-oriented thought patterns.

“It seems like [for] the majority of boards … their skill set is going to be in business,” Applegate said. “You get attorneys, and you can get people that are very focused on government regulations and [other] things, that make up senior leadership teams. And then you come in, and it’s so important to learn their language and to figure out how to frame the risks in the language … that they’re aware of, and to be able to establish that credibility.”

Basic Presentation Skills Pay off

While the skills involved in speaking to boards of directors and leadership teams go beyond what Applegate referred to as “Toastmasters-type of stuff,” some of the same rules apply. One of the most basic guidelines is that public speakers of any stripe have to know their audience.

For cybersecurity professionals presenting on OT threats, this means understanding the type of personnel who are going to be attending the meeting: Are they C-suite executives, or middle management working closer to the front lines? Are their backgrounds in law or finance, or do they have a firsthand knowledge of cybersecurity?

In addition to learning about the people who will be attending, Applegate advised security advisers to learn about the organizations for which they work. This means understanding the type of business that they do, but also getting a sense of how the business functions internally, how the leadership teams work together and what managers prioritize.

“I don’t think it’s magic; it’s people; it’s learning people, but some [things] have helped me to kind of get the temperature of the group,” Applegate said. “I’ve read historical meeting minutes. I’ve gone back and looked at the projects that got accomplished, and which things succeeded, which ones didn’t. I’ve watched videos sometimes, if there [were] videos available of different board meetings or the leadership meetings.”

Keep it Simple

Additional successful communication strategies that Applegate shared include keeping presentations simple by holding deeper information back for Q&A periods, rather than burying audiences in technical jargon up front. Keeping the talk grounded, through the use of benchmarks and clear metrics, is also essential; while IT experts must sometimes make assumptions where hard data are unavailable, this must be avoided when possible and clearly labeled when unavoidable.

“Don’t use FUD — fear, uncertainty and doubt,” Applegate said. “That’ll blow up in your face. It hurts your credibility. It sounds like you’re crying wolf or complaining. Instead, a risk assessment with a penetration test, or whatever, to help quantify likelihood … prompts lasting action and helps to change the culture as opposed to just sounding like you’re afraid and throwing out fear as a tool.”

However, Applegate also warned that presenters must impress the urgency of the threat on corporate leadership. Ensuring that those in responsible positions understand why investments in cybersecurity are needed can protect those programs down the line when other priorities threaten to take away focus.

“I think it’s table stakes that a program is not going to succeed without executive buy-in,” Applegate said. “Eventually you’re going to need money; some business leaders’ … projects are going to be at stake and they’re going to try to put a foot on the brakes for some of the security program, and the only way to get over that stuff is having the right kind of governance, which starts at the senior leadership.”

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‘Dragonscale’ Solar Shingles Will Power DC Community Solar Project

WASHINGTON — The “dragonscale” solar shingles that are powering Google’s (NASDAQ:GOOGL) massive eco-friendly campus in California’s Silicon Valley will soon also be pumping out electrons from the much smaller rooftop of a multifamily building in D.C., while cutting electric bills in half for about a half-dozen low-income families in the city.

The 21-kW installation in a residential neighborhood is the newest community solar project in D.C.’s Solar for All program, which to date has halved electric bills for about 6,600 households across the city. It is also the city’s first solar shingle project, hailed by local officials and the project developers who turned out on a rainy Monday afternoon to cut a symbolic green ribbon in front of the building.

Known in the industry as building-integrated PV (BIPV), the diamond-shaped solar shingles each produce 110 W of power. They were developed in Europe by SunStyle, a Chicago-based company with a fast-expanding international footprint, according to the company’s website. While the dragonscale shingles have been used in hundreds of projects in Europe, the Google campus and the D.C. multifamily rooftop are their first appearance in the U.S., said CEO Gene Rosendale.

The shingles are “similar to any solar panel, just smaller” and sturdier, Rosendale said. They can be installed like a standard slate roof, and essentially become the roof, he said.

Solar Shingle Aerial View (Studio202DC) Alt FI.jpgThe crew from Flywheel Development installed 21 kW of solar shingles on a multifamily dwelling in D.C.’s Ward 4. | Studio202DC

“Installers have to walk on it,” Rosendale said, including work crews loaded up with heavy equipment. “They can walk on it while they are installing it.”

The shingles also meet all required industry standards for BIPV, which include safety requirements for both solar and roofing materials, such as resistance to hail and snowstorms, he said.

“This project represents not just another solar installation; it’s emblematic of where we see the future of the sustainable built environment going,” said Jessica Pitts, co-founder and principal at Flywheel Development, the D.C.-based developer that built the project. “It is the beginning of a transformation away from sustainable infrastructure being extra, being in addition to the materials of yesterday, and a move toward a future where sustainability is truly integrated into our surroundings, into our homes, into our buildings and becomes part of the fabric of our communities.”

For City Councilmember Janeese Lewis George, the project reflects the moral commitment local officials in the nation’s capital have made in the face of the “devastating climate crisis that threatens every facet of our lives.”

“We have a moral responsibility to revolutionize our energy,” Lewis George said. “We have a moral responsibility to break barriers by making green energy inclusive and accessible for everyone through programs like Solar for All, and we have a moral responsibility to collaborate across agencies, communities and the private sector to make it all happen.”

‘The Innovative Stuff’

D.C.’s Solar for All program began funding projects in 2019, with the ambitious goal of installing enough solar — both residential and commercial projects — within the district’s 68.3 square miles to cut electricity bills in half for 100,000 low-income households.

With a target of 100% clean power by 2032, D.C.’s renewable portfolio standard requires utilities and retail electricity suppliers serving the city to provide increasing amounts of power from renewable energy every year or pay “alternative compliance fees.” That money has been a major revenue stream for Solar for All, allowing the city to pay significant incentives to developers building new projects for the program.

Incentives this year are $1.25/W for commercial projects and $1.50/W for single-family rooftop projects, according to the DC Sustainable Energy Utility, which administers Solar for All. Over the past three years, such incentives have helped to put solar panels on 328 single-family homes and to install 166 community solar projects.

The solar shingle project is one of 40 community projects Solar for All expects to complete by the end of the year, said Ted Trabue, the utility’s managing director.

Project financing is also helped by D.C.’s active market for solar renewable energy credits, which are currently selling around $300 per credit, down from $400 earlier this year.

And for projects like the solar shingle roof, DC Green Bank, founded in 2018, helps fill funding gaps, said Brandi Colander, the bank’s board chair.

“We take on the hard stuff; we take on the innovative stuff … that others were not quite sure they wanted to make a bet on,” Colander said at the ribbon cutting. “We are investing in helping people figure out how to navigate the system so they can make more pioneering investments like the one we have standing before us today.”

In the past three years, the bank has provided funding for a series of Flywheel projects, said Eli Hopson, the bank’s CEO.

“It’s harder for smaller organizations like Flywheel to find [funding],” Hopson said. “They had done smaller projects, but they hadn’t done anything at [a larger] scale.”

The company now has a track record of completing larger projects — including 24 community solar projects for Solar for All — so providing a construction loan for the solar shingle project was more straightforward, he said.

For Flywheel, the money was crucial. Before installation began, the four-unit building had a flat roof, and Pitts said the company wanted to build a traditional pitched roof to maximize power output from the solar shingles, which she estimated will generate about 27,000 kWh/year. The project is in the final stages of the interconnection process and could be online in the coming weeks, she said.

BIPV’s Early-stage Economics

Now that Flywheel has completed its first solar shingle project, Pitts is hoping more will follow. “I like the product and see a lot of potential in the combined solar roof technology,” she said. “We already have interest from additional property owners.”

Still, BIPV has yet to break out of its niche status in the U.S. solar market, with its slow growth attributed to the expense and inefficiency of solar roofing compared to panels. According to a recent report from industry analysts Grand View Research, the BIPV market in the U.S. was valued around $2.3 billion in 2021, but it could see a compound annual growth rate of 20.7% between now and 2030.

Tesla and GAF Energy are the major players, but the market is experiencing supply chain challenges, with Tesla putting a hold on its solar roofing installations in March. Despite such market turbulence, Rosendale said the raised awareness of solar roofing created by these companies has made it a perfect time for SunStyle to enter the U.S. market.

At more than $35 per square foot, SunStyle’s dragonscale shingles are still a premium-priced roofing choice, he said, but “it’s early-stage economics” for BIPV. “Over time, as the volume gets larger, it will become more mainstream,” he said.

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Connecticut Environmental Regulator Launches EJ Advisory Council

The Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) launched the state’s Equity and Environmental Justice Advisory Council with an inaugural meeting Tuesday.

Creation of the council “reflects a priority within DEEP and the Lamont administration to center equity and environmental justice in our work, especially when it comes to addressing environmental quality, energy equity, climate change mitigation and resiliency, health disparities, racial inequity and current and historic environmental injustice,” Commissioner Katie Dykes said at the meeting.

Dykes will co-chair the 18-member council with Mark Mitchell, associate professor of climate change, energy and environmental health equity at George Mason University.

“Historically, non-white communities, particularly African American communities, are exposed to a number of different environmental and social traumas, so cumulative risk is something that you will hear a lot as we move forward,” Mitchell said.

The Governor’s Council on Climate Change recommended formation of the environmental justice (EJ) group, and Gov. Ned Lamont authorized it as a part of DEEP in an executive order in December.

Among the council’s priorities will be to advise DEEP on how to incorporate EJ considerations into its programs, policies and activities. It will also be responsible for creating mechanisms for EJ communities to participate in DEEP’s work areas and developing a model plan for community engagement and outreach.

The council includes representatives from the Connecticut departments of public health, housing, transportation, and economic and community development. Their presence will “strengthen and inform” the council’s work and “help incorporate environmental justice principles and priorities in the work of those agencies,” Dykes said.

Initial work plan priorities will include establishing areas of DEEP’s authority that the council will focus on and the structure for their discussions. Dykes suggested the council form subcommittees that can address DEEP’s wide range of programs and responsibilities, such as land resources, environmental quality, climate mitigation and energy equity.

The council may also consider convening community meetings, particularly in EJ communities, to collect public comments on the topics covered by subcommittees, Dykes said.

Rep. David Michel (D) congratulated the council members on their appointments during the meeting and asked them to consider creating a subcommittee on energy facility permitting.

“Considering that today’s language in statutes makes it hard for DEEP to turn down a permit for a new polluting facility, or even an existing facility, permitting should definitely be a focus of the group,” he said. The legislature has tried to address the issue, he said, adding that the council’s work could support legislators’ ongoing efforts through, for example, better mapping of EJ and distressed communities and the facilities that cause pollution.

DEEP is currently facilitating a two-year project, as recommended by the governor’s climate council, to develop an EJ screening tool that identifies environmental and public health indicators across the state.

Dykes said the department anticipates scheduling quarterly council meetings, with the next one planned for September.

Member Priorities

The council took time during the meeting to get to know each other and share their priorities.

Sharon Lewis, executive director of the Connecticut Coalition for Environmental Justice, said the statewide coalition has a wide focus on environmental issues, but it is “majorly concerned” about zero waste and what Connecticut will do about it.

“Overall, we want to see an equitable sharing of the benefits and the burdens of the environment and meaningful involvement of those most impacted by the decisions that are implemented and affect their well-being,” Lewis said.

Taylor Mayes, an organizer for the Black Environmental Activist Movement, concurred with Lewis, saying that her work focuses on “making sure that black communities throughout Connecticut have the same access and opportunity to environmental assets and benefits as the rest of the state does.”

At the grassroots coalition CT Equity Now, Katharine Morris works to build bi-directional engagement with community members.

“I want to engage with them in a way that is sustainable so that they believe in us to actually represent their needs,” Morris said. CT Equity Now focuses on initiatives related to ecological health, sustainable food systems, clean transportation, transitioning to clean energy and “facilitating natural remedies to long-standing pollution impacts,” she said.

Maisa Tisdale, president of the Mary and Eliza Freeman Center for History and Community, said the center is solely focused on preservation-based equitable development in the state.

“The future of our community is directly and significantly impacted by remediation of brownfields,” she said. The remediation of shuttered utility brownfield sites and their return to communities for equitable development could represent “a form of reparations.”

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NJ Solar Sector Calls for Speedy Grid Modernization Plan

Solar developers embraced a new report by the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (BPU) on how to modernize and upgrade the state’s power grid to handle the expected dramatic rise in energy from wind and solar projects, but they told a public hearing Monday that the state needs to act faster.

The 102-page report, compiled for the BPU by consultant Guidehouse, of Lawrenceville, offers nine recommendations on how to improve what solar developers see as an aging grid that has limited capacity on the grid, which in some areas of the state can’t accept new interconnections. (See Solar Developers: NJ’s Aging Grid Can’t Accept New Projects.)

The suggestions in the report, which was released Friday, include streamlining the interconnection process and improving the state’s hosting capacity maps, which report how much generation can be added to a circuit. The report also suggested enabling developers to get a “pre-application study” that would allow them to see the available connection capacity in advance, rather than late in the development cycle.

Speakers from the solar industry, while welcoming the report, said the gravity of the situation requires additional moves.

“You’ve identified all the right things. We’re with you; we want to work and collaborate on this and move forward,” Fred DeSanti, executive director of the New Jersey Solar Energy Coalition, told the hearing. “Obviously, time is of the essence.

“My only comment would be is if we could have some kind of a parallel track where we could, as a triage measure, put money into opening some of the existing circuits that have been closed, where it’s obvious, cost effective,” he added. That would enable the industry to “open up some of these markets and will take a lot of pressure off the situation.”

Lyle Rawlings, a solar developer and founder of the Mid-Atlantic Solar Energy Industries Association, echoed the call for the BPU to move quickly.

“We urgently need ventures near-term that will keep circuits open and reopen ones that are currently restricted,” he said.

Clean Energy Surge

The hearing, the fourth to collect stakeholder input on current distribution grid interconnection policies and processes and potential improvements, was the last in the fact collection stage, which began in October. While stakeholders can submit written comments until July 19, the release date of the final report has not yet been set.

The effort is one of several New Jersey initiatives underway aimed at preparing, upgrading and improving the grid for the capacity expansion expected from the state’s advancing solar and wind sectors. New Jersey’s first community solar projects came online last year, and the state reshaped its solar incentive program. (See New Jersey Shoots for Key East Coast Wind Role.)

The state has so far approved three offshore wind projects — the 1,100-MW Ocean Wind 1, 1,148-MW Ocean Wind 2 and 1,510-MW Atlantic Shores — in two solicitations, and expects the first project to be operating in 2024. A third solicitation is planned for early 2023, and the state expects to approve further projects that will increase the state’s wind capacity to 7,500 MW by 2035.

The BPU is close to finishing a solicitation process for suggestions on how to best connect the offshore wind projects to the grid, which attracted 80 proposals. (See FERC Approves PJM-NJ Transmission Agreement.)

And the state legislature is considering a bill that would levy a fee to generate millions of dollars to modernize the grid. At a hearing of the Senate Energy and Environment Committee in May, developers said they wait for months, even years, to get projects connected, and sometimes the connection never happens.

Yet those delays are not unique to New Jersey. The U.S. Department of Energy this month launched an initiative, Interconnection Innovation eXchange (I2X), designed to identify and develop solutions to speed up the interconnection of clean energy projects. (See DOE Initiative Aims to Make Interconnection ‘Simpler, Faster, Fairer’.)

In April, PJM stakeholders overwhelmingly endorsed a plan for a new interconnection queue process amid concern over delays and heavy volume.

Abraham Silverman, strategic policy counsel for the BPU, opened Monday’s hearing by saying that addressing the grid issue is “absolutely critical.” He added that the PJM queue problems show what happens when the sector doesn’t get “the interconnection right.”

“Projects get delayed. … The energy transition slows down,” Silverman said.

Plans to Streamline, Fast Track

The BPU report, and its presentation at the hearing, said there are a variety of opportunities to streamline the application process through which new interconnections are sought, including updating the forms and resolving the fact that each utility has a different system.

The report also suggested that the industry adopt a new, uniform application software and platform system, and introduce new fees on Level 1 projects — smaller projects that are not currently required to pay fees — to pay for the upgrades.

Other proposals in the report include a recommendation that utilities adopt a uniform system of hosting capacity maps, which report how much spare capacity is available in different areas of the state. The current maps are “inconsistent,” resulting in the “quantity of closed circuits potentially being overestimated by stakeholders,” the presentation said.

“Stakeholder support for capacity hosting maps is strong in New Jersey,” the presentation said. “But the maps provide value only when updated with current data and relevant information regarding equipment costs.”

The report also concluded that that “there is no way to accelerate interconnection projects” under the state’s current system and no “fast track” process to speed up simpler projects. There is also no pre-application process that would enable a developer to learn in advance the availability of grid capacity and likely upfront costs, according to the report, which recommended such a process be implemented.

The report also suggested the state use the updated version of the recommended rules and regulations drafted by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers that govern interconnection and operability systems. And the report suggested that the state implement a systematic process that would “establish numerical cost and capacity thresholds” that would evaluate and determine, for example, whether an upgrade simply benefits certain distributed energy resources or has a benefit to all customers.

Reaching Energy Goals

Scott Elias, director of Mid-Atlantic state affairs for the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), said the report reflects the feedback that his members have presented to the consultant. But he added that the “key consideration is not just identifying opportunities to improve interconnection, but moving forward with these types of reforms with the pace and scale necessary for New Jersey to achieve its goals.”

“If we don’t make major strides on interconnection reforms in the next few years, it will be impossible to achieve New Jersey’s aggressive clean energy goals,” Elias said. He added that “there’s plenty of evidence that the status quo is not tenable.”

Elias also called for the BPU to create “a clear timetable for how [it] will evaluate how grid modernization costs can be spread over a broader set of beneficiaries.”

“I think moving to a system where developers pay an appropriate portion of upgrade costs and the remaining costs are socialized among all customer classes benefiting from that upgrade would help bring online much more clean energy on New Jersey’s grid,” he said.

Eric Miller, director of New Jersey energy policy for the Natural Resources Defense Council, said addressing interconnection issues will be key to reaching the goals in the state Energy Master Plan, and said the organization is “pleased” with the way the report is going.

“We recognize the significant importance of kind of tackling interconnection first, and we think, you know, the recommendations so far … make significant progress on this front,” he said.

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DOE Launches $500M Project to Put Clean Energy on Mine Lands

A 7-MW solar project now stands on land in Strafford, Vt., that was once the site of the largest copper mine in the U.S., and the Department of Energy is planning to use $500 million from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act to put clean energy on similar former mine lands across the country.

The DOE’s vision for the Clean Energy Demonstrations on Current and Former Mine Land Program is outlined in a request for information released Wednesday. The program’s goal is to fund two to five demonstration projects in different parts of the country. At least two of the projects must be solar, the RFI says, but the DOE’s definition of “clean energy” also includes geothermal; direct air capture; fossil fuel generation with carbon capture, utilization and sequestration; energy storage, including pumped hydro; and advanced nuclear.

Hybrid projects combining two or more of the designated clean energy technologies are also eligible for the program. Technologies not eligible include bioenergy, wind, hydropower (other than pumped hydro) or recovery of critical minerals, and the federal funds must be matched, dollar for dollar, with nonfederal funds.

“Developing clean energy on mine lands is an opportunity for fossil fuel communities, which have powered our nation for a generation, to receive an economic boost and play a leadership role in our clean energy transition,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said in a press release announcing the RFI.

A recent report from the Environmental Protection Agency identified 17,756 mine land sites, totaling 1.5 million acres, which, if fully developed, could provide close to 90 GW of power. The report highlights the Elizabeth Mine solar project in Vermont as an example of clean energy development on previously contaminated mine lands. The project has cut carbon dioxide emissions by about 6,000 tons and produces enough electricity per year to power 1,200 homes, the report says.

The RFI also lays out key criteria DOE will apply for project selection. Projects should have “a reasonable expectation of commercial viability and also demonstrate the ability to lower barriers for future clean energy projects to access private sector financing,” the RFI says.

Economic development is another key criterion, with the DOE prioritizing projects that will create the most jobs, direct and indirect, and boost local economies in frontline fossil fuel communities. Projects will also be evaluated on their estimated levelized cost of energy, the GHG emissions produced by energy generation and how long it will take to complete them.

Beyond job creation, the RFI also puts a heavy emphasis on environmental and energy justice. The RFI defines energy justice as “achieving equity in both the social and economic participation in the energy system.” For example, the RFI calls on projects to “increase parity in clean energy technology access and adoption.”

With reasonable completion times a high priority, the RFI also acknowledges the considerable challenges mine land projects may face in terms of permitting and having to mitigate existing environmental hazards at mine sites. The RFI asks for input on how the topography or subsurface condition of mine lands might affect a site’s suitability for clean energy development. Information is also requested on federal, state and local permitting requirements and potential obstacles in existing regulations.

The goal is to provide replicable models and best practices for future projects. “The selected projects will chart a course to navigate federal, state and local rules and regulations for siting and grid interconnection, mine remediation, post-mining land use, environmental safety and other important processes to successfully develop and operate clean energy projects on current and former mine land,” the DOE announcement said.

The DOE added it is working with its national labs to gather data on existing clean energy projects on mine lands to help identify “promising sites” for clean energy development. The comment period on the RFI will close on Aug. 15, and the DOE is planning a series of webinars that “will collect region-specific perspectives on the challenges and opportunities of clean energy development on mine land.”

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Reduced Driving a Hard Sell in GHG Plan, CARB Finds

Reducing the number of miles driven by residents is one of California’s strategies for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but state officials concede the goal will be difficult to accomplish.

The strategy appears in the California Air Resources Board’s climate change scoping plan, which lays out a pathway for the state to reach carbon neutrality.

A draft version of the plan, released in May, proposes reducing per-person vehicle miles traveled (VMT) by 12% by 2030 and 22% by 2045, as compared to 2019 levels.

During a CARB public hearing last week on the draft scoping plan, board member Diane Takvorian called for more aggressive VMT reduction targets: 25% by 2030 and 30% by 2035, compared to 2019 levels.

Takvorian asked CARB staff for further analysis of funding public transit versus spending money to get drivers to switch to ZEVs. Takvorian pointed to free-ride programs in the San Diego area that have helped boost transit ridership.

The San Diego Metropolitan Transit System (MTS) offered free rides in September 2021 to riders who used MTS’ new fare collection system. MTS’ total ridership that month was 4.92 million, 14% higher than August and 4% higher than in October, when the free-ride program was discontinued.

MTS is also offering free youth opportunity passes as a pilot program. In May, the first month of the program, the transit system’s number of youth accounts surged to 16,374, a 74% increase from the prior month, according to figures provided to NetZero Insider.

“We’re a car culture. We know how to help people buy cars,” said Takvorian, who represents the public on the CARB board. “What we don’t know how to do is change the culture so people ride public transit. We need to work on that more.”

Rajinder Sahota, CARB’s deputy executive officer for climate change and research, noted the challenges of reducing VMT.

“The problem is we’ve modeled very aggressive VMT targets in almost every scoping plan we’ve done,” Sahota said. “We’ve delivered on none of those. And so this is an entrenched problem in the scoping plan.”

Board member Daniel Sperling also expressed pessimism about the scoping plan’s VMT reduction goals.

“Ain’t gonna happen,” Sperling said. “It’s failed, and it’s going to continue to fail because of the land use patterns we have, the car-centric transportation system we have, the sprawl we have.”

Transit is already heavily subsidized and its share of passenger miles was falling even before the pandemic, said Sperling, who is a founding director of the Institute of Transportation Studies at the University of California, Davis

Making Transit Attractive

Gov. Gavin Newsom issued an executive order in September 2020 calling for all new cars sold in the state to be ZEVs by 2035. But even if the target is met, internal combustion cars will remain on the road for some time.

The draft scoping plan outlines a number of measures to reduce per-person VMT, such as increasing the affordability and convenience of public transit, so that it becomes a more attractive alternative to driving.

The plan proposes expanding infrastructure for active transportation, such as walking and biking, and building more housing in “transportation efficient” areas.

The draft scoping plan explores four scenarios for California to reach carbon neutrality. The scenario selected as the preferred alternative would bring the state to carbon neutrality by 2045. (See Draft Plan Seeks Calif. Carbon Neutrality by 2045 and Critics Tear into CARB Draft Climate Change Plan.)

The CARB board took no formal action during last week’s two-day hearing on the scoping plan. Board members weighed in on certain issues and asked staff for further analysis of topics such as VMT reduction.

More Cars per Household

CARB also released a report in June taking a closer look at VMT reduction efforts. Senate Bill 150, passed in 2017, requires the agency to prepare a report to the legislature every four years on the progress the state’s metropolitan planning organizations have made in reducing GHG emissions. CARB released the first SB 150 report in 2018.

“California is still not reducing GHG emissions from personal vehicle travel,” the new report said. “Per capita GHG emissions and per capita VMT continued to increase, though more slowly than in the 2018 progress report.”

The report found that California residents are driving to work more and carpooling less. The percentage of people who walk or bike to work, which was already small, is shrinking. At the same time, the number of vehicles per household is increasing and roadways are expanding, according to the report, which includes data through 2019.

Land use patterns are another factor contributing to VMT, the report said. People who live close to work, shopping and recreation don’t need to drive as much.

The report found that development in the state has become more compact since 2005, with the exception of the San Joaquin Valley, where development has become more spread out. Even where development is more compact, residents still can’t walk to “key destinations,” the report said.

The report said that the state must move beyond simply planning to reduce greenhouse gases and VMT.

“No matter how robust, regional plans alone cannot reduce emissions,” the report said. “It is critical that the state, including the legislature, focus attention on authorizing and funding strategies and on providing other policy tools that support implementation.”

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NJ City Calls for Delay to Ocean Wind 1

Ocean City, through which transmission from the first offshore wind project in New Jersey would run, argued Friday that the Board of Public Utilities (BPU) should delay the project while an administrative hearing and environmental studies of the line’s route are conducted.

The city made its argument during an online public hearing on a petition filed by developer Ørsted asking the BPU to approve an easement for the line to run underground across land developed with state Green Acres money, which funds the development of parkland and natural areas.

Ørsted is seeking approval under a new law passed by the legislature last year and enacted in July that gives the BPU authority to over-ride local government officials in land-use questions concerning offshore wind projects if the board finds that the land is “reasonably necessary” for the project’s construction.

The case is the first test of the law, and the dispute over the easement is one of the most prominent challenges so far for the 1,100-MW Ocean Wind 1, the first of three offshore projects approved to date by the BPU.

Dorothy F. McCrosson, solicitor for the city, questioned the legitimacy of the law, saying it has “not yet been tested in the courts” and said the petition should be heard by the Office of Administrative Law.

“It remains to be seen whether it will survive judicial scrutiny,” she said.

Ørsted is seeking a 30-foot-wide easement running the length of the city’s main island, which is about 8 miles long, for a 275-kV cable that will connect Ocean Wind’s turbines, about 15 miles offshore, to the PJM grid at a substation, sited on a closed coal-fired power plant in neighboring Upper Township.

Ocean City opposes the project, which was approved in 2019, as do local residents, who say the nearly 100 turbines will tarnish their ocean view. Also opposed are commercial fishermen, who say it will hurt their ability to fish, and tourism interests, who fear fewer visitors will come to enjoy a shoreline with turbines on the horizon. (See Ørsted NJ Wind Project Faces Local Opposition.)

Pristine Beach and Wetlands

BPU President Joseph Fiordaliso told speakers, however, that the hearing focused only on the narrow issue of whether the easement was reasonably necessary. Aside from attorneys from Ocean City and Ørsted, the only speaker was the director of the New Jersey Division of Rate Counsel, Brian O. Lipman. As in a court trial, each speaker was allowed an opening statement and time to rebut other speaker’s comments.

The BPU made no decision on the issue Friday, and Fiordaliso said the board will evaluate all the evidence presented and make a decision at a future, as yet undetermined, date.

McCrosson noted that the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), which last week released a draft environmental impact statement (DEIS), the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) and Army Corps of Engineers are working on environmental impact statements.

“Any one of these agencies might determine that the environmental impact of the proposed route through Ocean City is unacceptable,” McCrosson said. “In which case, the easements would not be reasonably necessary. Waiting until the environmental impacts can be addressed and understood would be prudent.”

She argued that Ocean Wind 1 could avoid the conflict with Ocean City if it opted to send the transmission through a different route, which would go through nearby Egg Harbor instead. She said the route would present no disruption to Ocean City, but Ørsted had dismissed it earlier because it would be more expensive.

“The overwhelming benefit of utilizing the Egg Harbor route is the utter lack of disturbance to the citizenry of Ocean City,” McCrosson said. “The city’s pristine beach and wetlands would not be disturbed. The streets would not be excavated.”

But attorney Gregory Eisenstark, representing Ocean Wind 1, said the developer has provided extensive testimony on the environmental and construction reasons why the Egg Harbor route was not suitable.

“The impacts to Ocean City and its residents will be minimal,” he said. “The line will be underground. Once the construction is completed, you won’t see it and you won’t hear it. And quite frankly, it will be no different than the underground facilities that are already in Ocean City.

“I suggest to you that Ocean City’s feigned objection to the route that we’ve selected has nothing to do with the actual onshore route. But it has to do with Ocean City’s overall objection to offshore wind.”

Eisenstark said the cost of the different routes evaluated had no bearing on the hearing because Ørsted will pay for it as part of its bid for the project and not ratepayers. He added that the “reasonable necessity” standard doesn’t mean that the easement has to be “absolutely necessary” to the project.

“It doesn’t mean it’s the only alternative,” he said. “It doesn’t even mean it’s the best alternative. It just means that the project evaluated different alternatives, and the alternative it has proposed is a reasonable one. It doesn’t have to be the best one. It doesn’t have to be the lowest-cost one.”

Appraisal Offer

The three offshore wind projects approved by the BPU so far total about half the state’s target of 7,500 MW by 2035. The other two, the 1,148-MW Ocean Wind 2 and 1,510-MW Atlantic Shores, were approved in June 2021. The state expects the first of three more solicitations to begin early in 2023. (See NJ Awards Two Offshore Wind Projects.)

BOEM’s DEIS concluded that the project would not have a major impact on most of the 19 environmental and related categories scrutinized in the report. But the 1,408-page report did find that it would likely have a significant, and in some cases major, impact on marine navigation and vessel traffic. (See BOEM Draft EIS Finds Potential Major Impacts from 1st NJ OSW Project).

Eisenstark said Ørsted has discussed the needs of the project with Ocean City officials for three years. The developer filed its petition asking for the easement after sending a formal letter on Aug. 11 seeking the town’s blessing for the easement. Ørsted also obtained an appraisal of the value of the easement and offered to buy it for 10 times the amount, but it has not received a response from the city, he said.

“Ocean Wind would prefer to reach a voluntary agreement with Ocean City,” he said. “But unfortunately, we have not been able to reach an agreement.”

In May, the New Jersey Division of Rate Counsel told a hearing on the plan that it had concerns about the Ocean City route and believes there was an acceptable alternative that would be longer but would result in fewer disturbances.

But on Friday, Rate Counsel Lipman said he would like to contribute to the evaluation of the easement but could not because the division had not been able to obtain sufficient insight. He questioned the process behind the hearing.

“We have not had the opportunity to fully probe that issue,” he said. “There was no discovery in this matter. We asked Ocean Wind if they would ask answer some questions, and they did answer some of our questions. But not all of our questions. And they didn’t have to because there was no discovery in this process.

“Ocean City raises a number of issues that, quite frankly, we would have liked to have resolved if we’d known about them through discovery,” he said. The cost of each route is relevant, and that is recognized by the state Supreme Court so that the board can determine whether it is reasonably necessary for the developer to opt for one route over another, he said.

“I understand this is the first case of its type. And so the process was going to be somewhat different,” he said, adding, “We don’t believe there’s sufficient evidence in the record for that decision to be made.”