The U.S. Department of Energy on Aug. 6 announced a $2.2 billion investment in the nation’s grid for eight projects across 18 states aimed at protecting against growing threats of extreme weather events, lowering costs for communities and catalyzing additional grid capacity to meet load growth stemming from an increase in manufacturing and data centers.
Funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law’s Grid Resilience and Innovation Partnerships (GRIP) Program, the projects “will catalyze nearly $10 billion in total public and private investment to bring reliable, affordable, clean energy to Americans,” DOE said.
This deployment of new, innovative transmission infrastructure and technology upgrades to the existing grid will add nearly 13 gigawatts of grid capacity -- including 4,800 megawatts of offshore wind, it said. The projects will upgrade more than 1,000 miles of transmission in total.
Part of DOE’s Building a Better Grid Initiative and authorized by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the GRIP Program funding represents the federal government’s single largest direct investment into critical grid infrastructure, DOE noted.
The selections announced on Aug. 6 were made through Grid Innovation Program grants, one of three GRIP funding mechanisms, that seek to deploy projects that use innovative approaches to transmission, storage, and distribution infrastructure to enhance grid resilience and reliability.
Here are additional details on the projects:
New York Power Authority
The New York Power Authority’s project Clean Path New York is an underground and underwater High-Voltage Direct Current transmission line that will deliver 1,300 MW of renewable energy from upstate and western New York to New York City.
The project, one of the largest transmission projects contracted by the State of New York in 50 years, establishes a public-private partnership between New York Power Authority, Invenergy, and EnergyRe that will decarbonize the nation’s largest urban center and fortify the resilience of an electric grid serving 20 million people daily.
Clean Path New York will unlock significant amounts of renewable generation in upstate and western New York, drastically reduce the need for fossil-fuel generation, and provide meaningful employment and educational opportunities for frontline communities. The project will ultimately deliver enough zero-carbon electricity to power 15% of NYC’s annual consumption.
- Project: Transforming the Empire State: Clean Path New York
- Applicant/Selectee: New York Power Authority
- Federal cost share: $30,000,000
- Recipient cost share: $3,209,440,351
- Project location: New York
- Project type: Transmission
California Energy Commission
The California Harnessing Advanced Reliable Grid Enhancing Technologies for Transmission (CHARGE 2T) project is a public-private partnership that will drive large-scale expansion to transmission capacity and improvements to interconnection process to increase and accelerate equitable access to renewable energy across California.
CHARGE 2T will reconductor more than 100 miles of transmission lines with advanced conductor technologies and deploy dynamic line ratings to quickly and significantly increase the state’s system capacity to integrate more renewable energy onto the grid.
CHARGE 2T also supports transmission interconnection reform through process improvements, an interconnection portal, workforce investment, and educational resource development.
- Project: CHARGE 2T: California Harnessing Advanced Reliable Grid Enhancing Technologies for Transmission
- Applicant/Selectee: California Energy Commission
- Federal cost share: $600,561,319
- Recipient cost share: $900,841,978
- Project location: California
- Project type: Transmission
Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources
Power Up New England brings together New England states, ISO New England, public utilities, and an emerging technology developer to deploy an integrated portfolio of replicable, grid-benefitting technologies across the region.
The project will include new and upgraded points of interconnection for offshore wind and a long-duration energy storage system to increase electric reliability and resilience, diversify New England’s resource mix, accelerate the region’s clean energy transition, reduce energy burden on consumers, and deliver innovative models for further investments in New England and other regions.
- Project: Power Up New England
- Applicant/Selectee: Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources
- Federal cost share: $389,345,755
- Recipient cost share: $499,212,688
- Project location: Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Vermont
- Project type: Transmission and Storage
Montana Department of Commerce
The North Plains Connector Interregional Innovation project will catalyze transformative development in U.S. energy infrastructure by building a 3,000 MW High-Voltage Direct Current Voltage Source Converter transmission line, bridging the Western and Eastern Interconnections.
The core project, North Plains Connector, would be the first HVDC project to connect three regional control entities: the Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC), Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), and Southwest Power Pool (SPP).
- Project: North Plains Connector Interregional Innovation (NPCII)
- Applicant/Selectee: Montana Department of Commerce
- Federal cost share: $700,000,000
- Recipient cost share: $2,899,540,962
- Project location: Montana, North Dakota
- Project type: Transmission
North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality and State Energy Office
The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality State Energy Office, in partnership with Duke Energy, will implement advanced transmission technology to meet growing electricity demand in eastern North Carolina and improve reliability.
The North Carolina Innovative Transmission Rebuild project will reconstruct the Lee-Milburnie 230 kV transmission line, incorporating high-temperature, low-sag advanced conductors and monopole steel structures that will enhance resilience and reliability within the existing right-of-way.
- Project: North Carolina Innovative Transmission Rebuild
- Applicant/Selectee: North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality State Energy Office
- Federal cost share: $57,099,386
- Recipient cost share: $57,099,386
- Project location: North Carolina
- Project type: Transmission
Redwood Coast Energy Authority
The Tribal Energy Resilience and Sovereignty Project will empower four Tribes in Northern California—the Hoopa Valley, Yurok, Karuk, and Blue Lake Rancheria Tribes—to develop Tribe-owned and -operated nested microgrids.
This system will transform an outage-prone area through the deployment of reliable, resilient, community-led energy systems. TERAS will utilize innovative technology, advance Tribal Energy Sovereignty, create durable and lasting change in disadvantaged and vulnerable communities, and develop a replicable public-private partnership model for equitable and community-driven grid modernization.
- Project: Tribal Energy Resilience and Sovereignty (TERAS) Project
- Applicant/Selectee: Redwood Coast Energy Authority
- Federal cost share: $87,629,455
- Recipient cost share: $88,971,068
- Project location: California
- Project type: Microgrids
Utah Office of Energy Development
The Utah Office of Energy Development’s Reliable Electric Lines: Infrastructure Expansion Framework (Project RELIEF) will deploy advanced conductor cables to significantly boost transmission capacity using existing rights-of-way, which will improve grid reliability for 700,000 utility customers across four states and five tribal nations and enable the integration of more than 500 MW of renewable energy.
- Project: Reliable Electric Lines: Infrastructure Expansion Framework (Project RELIEF)
- Applicant/Selectee: Utah Office of Energy Development
- Federal cost share: $249,557,047
- Recipient cost share: $252,030,385
- Project location: Utah, Oregon, Wyoming, Idaho, Arizona, California
- Project type: Transmission
Virginia Department of Energy
The Virginia Department of Energy, along with its partners, will implement Battery Energy Storage System technology at the Iron Mountain data center in Virginia, and has plans to deploy a combination of turbine, solar PV, and BESS technologies at the Grace Complex in South Carolina.
Data centers are one of the leading drivers of U.S. electricity demand growth, and this project will deploy critical clean energy and operational solutions that improve resilience for data centers as well as local and regional power grids.
- Project: Data Center Flexibility as a Grid Enhancing Technology
- Applicant/Selectee: Virginia Department of Energy
- Federal cost share: $85,433,351
- Recipient cost share: $106,046,099
- Project location: Virginia and South Carolina
- Project type: Transmission & Distribution
In addition to the Grid Innovation Program, the GRIP Program includes two additional funding mechanisms: Grid Resilience Utility and Industry Grants that provide funding to the private sector to strengthen and modernize America’s power grid against wildfires, extreme weather, and other disruptive events that are exacerbated by the effects of climate change, with a focus on grid hardening efforts; and Smart Grid Grants fund technology investments that will increase how much power the grid can handle; prevent faults that may lead to wildfires or other system disturbances, integrate more renewable energy; and facilitate the integration of electrified vehicles, buildings, and other devices.
The second round of selections for GRIP’s the Grid Resilience Utility and Industry Grants and the Smart Grid Grants will be announced later this year.
