Commissioner Rosner's Letters to ISOs/RTOs Regarding Interconnection Automation

As a Commissioner at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), my priority is ensuring the reliable, affordable, and abundant energy that American families depend on to prosper and American businesses require to grow, including to power the artificial intelligence revolution and re-shore advanced manufacturing all across our country.  I know from our conversations that this is your priority as well.  Recent experience has demonstrated that improving the speed and efficiency of the electric grid interconnection process is key to achieving these shared goals, and this has become a national imperative.

Your organization’s work to streamline your interconnection process by implementing reforms in accordance with FERC Order No. 2023 will lay the groundwork for significant improvements.  I also strongly believe that achieving a truly fast and efficient interconnection process requires continuous innovation that leverages the latest software and automation solutions. 

To that end, I am writing to you and your colleagues at other RTOs and ISOs to highlight encouraging results regarding interconnection automation software platforms.  Initial deployment of these automation tools has shown that they can dramatically reduce the time, cost, and intensive technical labor associated with the interconnection study process.  One application reproduced the manual study of a large interconnection cluster—which took nearly two years to complete—in just 10 days and arrived at largely similar results.[1]  Platforms also report the ability to reduce cluster re-study times from weeks or months to days or less.[2]  While interconnection automation is complex and new tools cannot be fully implemented overnight, these early results suggest transformative potential to reduce backlogged queues and connect critically needed energy resources to the grid, faster and more efficiently than ever before.[3]  

I look forward to an opportunity to meet soon to discuss your experience with interconnection automation technologies to date, the prospects for further deploying them going forward, and, most importantly, how the Commission can support such innovation. 

Sincerely,

David Rosner, Commissioner