The Solar and Storage Industries Institute expects that grid operator SPP’s proposal to reform its interconnection process by linking transmission planning with interconnection would achieve “game-changing interconnection reform,” said David Gahl, SI2’s executive director.
He encouraged other transmission grid operators to “look closely at this proposal.”
While SPP proposes to assign solar and storage developers higher upfront costs than it does now, SI2 said in a report that developers would have “guaranteed certainty for project completion and connection at the end of the process.” Interconnection customers have signaled through a stakeholder process that they are “willing to pay significantly higher costs in exchange for the reliability of the new process,” the report says.
Commit or walk away
According to SI2’s report, every three years SPP would conduct a long-term planning study that would consider both existing generation and proposed generation projects waiting in the interconnection queue, and would forecast needed generation to meet demand over the next 20 years.
The study would generate granular results for regions and sub-regions within the SPP service territory, identifying prospective locations for generators to connect to the system.
Every year SPP would also conduct a ten-year assessment recommending any necessary transmission construction.
SPP proposes to assess a grid contribution fee for new generators, SI2 said, reflecting regional and subregional transmission costs, plus any project-specific upgrade costs.
Interconnection customers would then decide whether to commit to the assigned costs “or walk away,” SI2 said.
ERIS or NRIS
Under its proposal, SPP would allow interconnection customers to choose either energy-only resource interconnection service that does not guarantee transmission service, known as ERIS or “connect-and-manage,” or network resource interconnection service, known as NRIS, which provides firm transmission service.
According to an SPP slide provided in SI2’s report, the potential cost range for ERIS would be $17 to $27 per kW, while the cost for NRIS would be $24 to $34 per kW, with those costs being higher than historical costs at least partly because they capture “contributions toward transmission build-out and other upgrade costs.”
SI2 reports that SPP expects its proposal would:
- Reduce interconnection times from 18 months to 7 months
- Reduce unplanned restudies by 75%, thereby limiting project delay
- Reduce overall study costs.
SPP’s Consolidated Planning Proposal is now being evaluated by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. SPP manages transmission in a region extending from North Dakota to Oklahoma.
The American Council on Renewable Energy has published a report by Grid Strategies that also favors transmission planning followed by the interconnection process. That report describes a similar process used by California grid operator CAISO.
The SI2 report is titled “Interconnection Reform: How One Grid Operator is Changing the Game.”
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