The grid operator for most of Texas told federal regulators on Wednesday that adding additional generation is “a better approach” to ensuring energy security than constructing new interregional transmission.
The North American Electric Reliability Corp. published its Interregional Transfer Capability Study in November, identifying 35 GW of “prudent” capacity additions between areas of the United States. The recommendations included 14.1 GW of additional transfer capability between the Electric Reliability Council of Texas and other areas.
The study has faced some pushback, with grid planners across the Eastern Interconnection saying it lacks sufficient detail to drive investment.
ERCOT officials, meanwhile, say efforts they have taken to strengthen the grid since Winter Storm Uri in 2021 are already boosting reliability and adding new resources faster than it is possible to build transmission. Those reliability improvements include changes to wholesale market mechanisms, weatherization efforts, development of new ancillary services and the voter-approved Texas Energy Fund, which provides low-cost loans to develop new gas generation.
The TEF program received 72 applications for projects representing over 38 GW of proposed new dispatchable generation, and as of mid-January projects totaling 9,791 MW had been moved forward to the due diligence phase of the program, ERCOT said. Those projects have an average expected commercial operations date of May 2027.
One 930-MW project was withdrawn from the TEF queue on Feb. 17 due to supply chain constraints. “One or more replacement projects will likely be selected from the pool of projects that were not initially selected for the due diligence phase of the program,” the grid operator told FERC.
ERCOT also said its rapid generation interconnection process “has resulted in an ever-accelerating increase” in new generation, according to filed comments. At the end of January, ERCOT had 389 GW of generation resources in its interconnection queue, it said.
“While not every resource in the interconnection queue will ultimately be built, ERCOT’s interconnection process allows resources to achieve commercial operations in approximately 30 months or fewer (assuming no construction delays or supply chain issues),” ERCOT said. “This is significantly faster than developing interregional transmission, as a large, interregional transmission line can take over a decade to design, permit, construct, and energize.”
