As for the excess cost, the County believes that a special customer class, made up of high-wattage customers, would be proper for the Commission to consider. The increase in electrical demand can be directly traced to the connection of an identifiable class of such high-wattage users to the grid. It is in the public interest for the Commission to shift the cost of undergrounding some of these lines to the high-wattage customers creating the demand for them.  

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The citizens of Loudoun County are expressing significant concern about the impact that further above-ground transmission lines will have on their community. With hundreds of miles of these lines already crisscrossing the County, citizens are hoping for a thoughtful approach to future development. Numerous comments from the community reflect a growing movement to explore alternatives to traditional transmission lines. Organizations such as the Lansdowne Conservancy, Waterford Foundation, Loudoun Transmission Line Alliance, and Piedmont Environmental Council have organized public meetings to oppose these proposals, driven by a strong desire to prevent overhead transmission lines from dominating the landscape and causing irreparable harm to historic, economic, and natural resources in Loudoun. The community opposition was key in PJM’s decision to approve an alternate route for delivery.
WHAT MEASURES CAN BE TAKEN TO PROTECT LOUDOUN COUNTY’S SCENIC ASSETS FROM THE IMPACT OF HIGH-VOLTAGE POWER LINES?
Where appropriate and feasible, undergrounding may provide a reliable and long- lasting energy transmission solution that is less prone to outages with minimal disruption to the look and feel of the community at large. This approach will preserve the landscape for current and future residents and maintain the history and beauty of the County. Additionally, it supports a reliable and sustainable path forward as Virginia works to meet its energy production and transmission goals. By placing power lines underground, impact to scenic assets can be minimized while ensuring a resilient and efficient power infrastructure.

Kansas landowners know that these decisions should not be left up to bureaucrats in Washington. When I return to Washington, D.C., I will be introducing legislation that will help protect Kansans private property from being seized by the federal government to build this transmission corridor.

This legislation will:

1. Ban federal funds from being used to condemn private property to be used in a NIETC designation corridor, and

2. Prohibit FERC from using its authority to overrule a state regulator’s rejection of an electric transmission project.

Sean Stott, with the Labourer's International Union, said: "The court's decision here is clearly a political, not a legal one. If upheld, this ruling will slow down needed infrastructure investment while inviting frivolous litigation for all sorts of future vital infrastructure projects critical to our economy and clean energy goals.  We hope the court will stand up for the thousands of labour jobs created by this project."

That law was approved by the General Assembly in 2021 as part of the Climate and Equitable Jobs Act, a broad legislative package that was meant to decrease the state’s reliance on fossil fuels and eliminate greenhouse gas emissions from electricity generation by 2045.  
CEJA does not name Grain Belt but says a project of its magnitude “shall be deemed” a public use line, giving the company the ability to invoke eminent domain if needed – a policy opposed by many farmers and large landowners. 
The law includes voltage and capacity parameters and requires any “qualifying direct current project” to pass through nine counties along the proposed route of the Grain Belt Express project. Those counties are Pike, Scott, Greene, Macoupin, Montgomery, Christian, Shelby, Cumberland and Clark.
The Farm Bureau contends that the provision at issue in the case was added as unconstitutional “special legislation” meant to provide a way to benefit the Grain Belt project specifically. 

Proponents of the Grain Belt Express point to this reading of CEJA as a threat to other renewable energy projects. 

“Today’s ruling completely misinterprets law and threatens billions in energy cost savings for Grain Belt Express consumers,” Invenergy Director of Public Affairs Dia Kuykendall said Friday. “The erroneous ruling has far-reaching implications beyond Grain Belt Express and contradicts the State's efforts to secure a reliable and affordable clean energy future.”

In 2022, the most recent year for which data is available, the Illinois Supreme Court only accepted about 7 percent of petitions to appeal filed.

BRA auctions are usually held three years in advance of the delivery year. While the 2025/2026 auction was originally scheduled to be held in May 2022, it was suspended while the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) considered the approval of new capacity market rules. The recent July 2024 auction stems from a compressed schedule that aims to return to the three-year forward basis. According to PJM, the next BRA—for the 2026/2027 delivery year—is scheduled for December 2024.

Unfortunately, the record demonstrates that GBX failed to provide any evidence to meet the burden required by section 8-406.1(f)(3). To satisfy section 8-406.1(f)(3), the applicant must show that it is capable of financing the construction of the proposed project. Therefore, GBX must prove that it has the capacity to finance the project prior to the Commission granting any CPCN. Stated differently, the applicant’s capability of financing the project is a condition precedent to the Commission’s issuance of a CPCN. 

While appearing before the Commission, GBX did not claim that it had the capability of funding the project. Instead, GBX claimed that it expects to be able to obtain financing for the project once customer contracts are executed, supply agreements are executed, and site control is obtained in the future. But in addition to this, it also plans on heavily relying upon debt financing. It calls this method of speculative financing, the “project financing approach.” GBX stated that it anticipates financing approximately 65% to 80% of the project through debt, with the debt being funded largely through the Department of Energy grants or commercial banks. However, at the time of the Commission’s decision, GBX had no customers for the project, no commitments from any financial institution, and had not been awarded any funding or debt commitments from the Department of Energy to provide financing for the project. What is even more concerning is that the wind farm and renewable projects in Kansas, for which this transmission line is supposedly necessary in order to distribute the “clean energy” these projects will produce and deliver to Illinois, do not exist. Quite simply, the projects had not been constructed at the time of the Commission’s Final Order, and no evidence was put forth indicating that any commitments, contracts, or construction bids had been obtained or negotiated. 

We note that the sister project in Northern Illinois which was overseen by Rock Island has allegedly been abandoned despite the contentions of GBX before the Commission of the necessity and market demand for such a project. Thus, GBX has not offered any evidence that it “is capable” of funding the project; it instead has only offered evidence of a future, and highly speculative, plan of possibly funding the project. It simply asked the Commission to broadly speculate, and to trust that many unknown variables will fall into place. It does not contend, “let us build it and they will come,” but instead, “give us approval, then we will finance it, and then we will build it.” This falls short of proving the financing capability required. 

Ultimately, there was no showing that GBX as it was situated at the time of the Commission’s hearing and decisions was financially able to finance and construct the project. In fact, GBX acknowledged before the Commission that it had no customers for the project, had secured no bank commitments, no Department of Energy commitments, etc. It asked the Commission to speculate as to its future capability, and the Commission improperly obliged.

Therefore, the Final Order entered by the Commission finding otherwise was made in error and requires reversal. 

For the foregoing reasons, we reverse the Commission’s March 8, 2023, order granting GBX a CPCN pursuant to section 8-406(b-5) and other related provisions. ​