“We’re on the verge of energy abundance and independence if we can just get the energy from where it’s made to where it’s needed,” said Colorado Sen. John Hickenlooper who co-sponsored a bill that would establish a minimum-transfer requirement for regions to be able to transfer at least 30% of their peak electrical loads with other regions. “Show me a new power project in this country and I’ll show you red tape and haphazard grid planning holding us back.” Democrats pushed to have the bill included in the debt ceiling deal but Republican opposition prevented it.

Often, transmission projects fall by the wayside because of the capital required upfront and the logistics of tying together buyers and sellers in regional marketplaces with different rules and processes. “If you’re going to inject power you have to put money down ahead of time for system upgrades. Independent developers are asked to say yes or no on those down payments before having firm interconnection permissions and timeline certainty from grid operators,” said Rob Taylor, director of transmission at Chicago-based Invenergy. “Our request is to standardize the processes, timelines and definitions so you can have a level playing field."
Invenergy’s Grain Belt Express transmission project, the highest-capacity line in development in the US, will connect four states across 800 miles, taking mostly wind from Kansas (in the Southwest Power Pool) and delivering it into MISO and PJM, the ISO/RTO covering much of the northeast. With a capacity of 5 GW, the proposed project will use HVDC technology. Since Invenergy acquired the project in 2020, it has progressed through key state approvals, with one remaining approval expected at the end of August. Assuming full construction starts at the end of 2024, the project will have been in the works for over a dozen years.

Grain Belt Express has kept Staff apprised of the updates that are the subject of this Motion, including as recently as March 1, 2023.

How will the Amended Financing Requirement protect landowners?

The Amended Financing Requirement will prevent any possibility that Grain Belt Express begins construction of the Project and installs structures on easements but later abandons them because of insufficient funds to complete the Project.

Constructing the Project in two phases is in the public interest of Kansas because it will allow the benefits of Phase I to accrue much earlier than would otherwise be possible. The regulatory approval process in Illinois had been subject to extensive delays because of now resolved appeals of the ICC’s 2015 decision to grant a CPCN to Grain Belt Express Clean Line LLC in ICC Docket 15-0277.

Grain Belt Express will use project financing as previously approved in this Docket. As a reminder, after advancing development and permitting activities to a status at which developers of wind and solar generation facilities and other potential customers of the transmission line are willing to enter into commercial agreements for an undivided interest (purchase or lease) or long-term contracts for transmission capacity on the Project, Grain Belt Express will enter such contracts with interested parties that satisfy necessary creditworthiness requirements. Grain Belt Express will then raise debt capital using the aforementioned contracts as security for the debt. Grain Belt Express may also raise additional equity capital.
In addition to obtaining state regulatory approvals, Grain Belt Express will need to enter contracts for a portion of the transmission capacity on each Phase prior to obtaining full financial commitments for the Project. The exact percentage of capacity that needs to be under contract prior to obtaining full financing commitments for each Phase will depend on the price, counterparty creditworthiness and terms in years of the signed transmission contracts.

Phase I being independently economically viable ensures that Phase I will be completed. Phase I is independently economically viable because, upon completion, it will be operational and capable of delivering power into Missouri. As described above, Phase I will be capable of delivering power into Missouri via its interconnections with the MISO system along the Ameren 345 kV AC transmission line connecting the McCredie substation and the Montgomery substation and with the AECI system at the McCredie 345 kV substation. Not only do these circumstances ensure that Phase I will be completed, they also ensure that Phase I by itself will allow large amounts of renewable energy to be built in southwest Kansas and to access the MISO markets and AECI system and compete to serve customer load without impacting Kansas ratepayers.

The fact these long-in-the-works projects are reaching similar milestones appears to be coincidence; no single policy is moving them forward. They are, however, advancing at a time of increasing understanding by local communities and even traditional opponents — including some conservation groups — of the need to move clean energy from rural outposts and to build more durable electric systems after a series of weather and climatic events have felled grids in recent years.

Polling indicates the public’s feelings about a number of various topics on any given day. But it can also be misleading if viewed out of context — especially when it comes to land use issues.

How is it, for example, that most Americans support wind energy in general, but emotive opponents can block transmission lines delivery wind energy or wind farms in some local communities?

So, the jury’s in, right? Everyone loves renewable energy projects. But wait.

But the emotional opposition appears to fly in the face of surveys and polls showing national support for clean energy generation and transmission. What’s going on? Do these polls and surveys lack credibility? No. In fact, they are spot-on in terms of reflecting how Americans feel about renewable generation and distribution projects and how they may positively impact our communities given the perceived global threats of climate change, greenhouse gases and negative impact to wildlife over time. Today, based on a solid campaign by climate change advocates, the renewable energy industry, the current Obama administration and constant media pounding, the threat to our economy and the environment posed by carbon-emitting generation sources is very real and frankly easy to grasp. The arguments have been made and, let’s face it, many Americans are buying in.

But it’s easy to support a wind energy project without a real wind turbine or transmission line literally staring you in the face. That’s where rational thinking ends and passionate “defense of the community” (or defense of the children for that matter) campaigns begin.

...shop for a home in a community of interest and share the rumor of a new 765 kV transmission line going across the property down the road, in front of the view of the mountain range. What’s the survey say then? Chances are you may not find majority support, even from residents who responded in the poll you fielded yesterday.

Perhaps at best, polling identifies the size of the silent majority you have on your side when they are under no local threat of changing their daily lives. Winning hearts and minds in a poll won’t necessarily win you a permit at town hall.

Renewable energy is great in our public opinion, just not when it gets in the way of our personal point of view.

Grain Belt Express is exploring various different ways for the energy to be transmitted across the lines that we're proposing to build here.  It's not finalized.

Now more than ever, we need strong environmental review and public engagement processes to avoid harming communities while effectively speeding up development of much-needed infrastructure to enable a rapid clean energy transition.

A recent study from MIT concludes that a significant hurdle in developing clean energy infrastructure projects is local opposition --and early community engagement can avoid delays or cancellations. To address this major slow down and to ensure that our new transmission is developed in an equitable manner, we must work with the very communities that our infrastructure is supposed to serve and not against them.

1. Public Participation: Local residents (their legislative representatives and public agencies) oppose projects in which they believe their worries are not adequately being attended to by the developer.
   
   

Data shows the public, including communities hosting wind and solar projects, approve of renewables and want more of them.

Unfortunately, proposed wind and solar projects have faced an avalanche of local opposition in recent years...

Unfortunately, proposed wind and solar projects have faced an avalanche of local opposition in recent years, often based on misinformation or outright fallacies. Opposition groups, following a playbook organized by a fossil-funded think tank, spread fallacies about impacts to wildlife, property values, health, and more, sowing fear and anger.