Hill Heat

The Committee will conduct a legislative hearing to examine Sen. Harry Reid’s (D-NV) Clean Renewable Energy and Economic Development Act, draft legislation regarding siting of electricity transmission lines, including increased federal siting authority and regional transmission planning.

• Jon Wellinghoff, acting chairman, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
• Tony Clark, commissioner, North Dakota Public Service Commission
• Reid Detchon, executive director, Energy Future Coalition
• James Dickenson, managing director, JEA
• Joseph Welch, president, ITC Holdings Corp.
• Michael Morris, chairman, American Electric Power
• Graham Edwards, acting president, Midwest ISO.

E&E News:

Reid’s bill is similar to a national clean energy grid plan introduced last month by the Energy Future Coalition and the Center for American Progress, which is supported by a range of stakeholders including the American Wind Energy Association, ITC Holdings, Sierra Club and Natural Resources Defense Council.

Under Reid’s bill, the Energy Department would have less than one year to identify “zones” where renewable energy could produce more than 1 gigawatt of electricity or where there was insufficient transmission capacity to carry that much electricity from renewable energy generators in two of the nation’s main grid systems: the Western and Eastern Interconnects. The third system is contained within Texas, which has already implemented a renewable energy zone and grid planning policy that was part of the inspiration for Reid’s bill.

A broad coalition of stakeholders – including state regulators, utilities, environmental advocates, transmission owners, grid operators and energy developers – would then have one year to plan a transmission roadmap for each of the two interconnections to integrate these renewable energy zones into the current grid and to create a cost allocation system for companies to understand how they will recover their investment. A transmission surcharge on all load bearing entities within the two systems would be developed and implemented by FERC to cover up to $80 million for the costs of the planning.

Companies would then apply to FERC for authorization to build projects within the “green” transmission roadmap. If states fail to participate or develop an interconnection wide roadmap or formulas to pay for the projects in one year, FERC would have the authority to step in.