Otherwise, GBX will be placed in the position of having to decide whether to commit millions of dollars in security or cash pursuant to the executed TCA before it understands its total upgrade cost exposure associated with the Injection Rights.

The renewables spurred by the IRA require a considerable transmission buildout. Accomplishing it will be no mean feat. The most oft-proposed solution is to federalize ever more of the transmission planning and permitting process. That may sound better in theory than in practice.

Furthermore, the federal government has a dismal record in streamlining infrastructure permitting, even when it is needed. Look no further than the Western U.S., where federal lands are often an obstacle to transmission, rather than a facilitator of it.

Infrastructure opponents have had increasing success obstructing projects with a federal nexus. FERC’s natural gas pipeline certification program is a good reference point. Activists have blocked needed energy projects through the aggressive use of litigation at every step of the permitting and review process. Without meaningful reform to federal laws like the National Environmental Policy Act and the Clean Water Act, all those litigation weapons will now be in the hands of interveners seeking to stop electric transmission lines.

Beyond just educating the neighbors of a proposed project, former U.S. Rep. Joseph P. Kennedy III (D-Mass.), now managing director of Citizens Energy, said developers and utilities should explore ways to ensure that the expansions directly benefit those communities.

Such arrangements can prove worthwhile even to for-profit companies by alleviating residents’ concerns that large transmission projects could lower property values or disrupt their neighborhoods with no visible benefit to them, Kennedy said. The costs of the delays or resiting of projects can often well exceed the expense of profit sharing with those communities, he argued.

Former FERC Commissioner Colette Honorable, now a partner at Reed Smith leading the firm’s energy regulatory group, noted that getting all parties on board with a project in the early phases can reduce the likelihood of prolonged, and expensive, delays at FERC and the federal courts.

“You’re in trouble if you have a matter pending and the first time you hear them is when they object,” she said.

Likewise, she said incorporating equity into the work done by RTOs can be accomplished by examining what voices are missing at the table and including those stakeholders who aren’t represented.

“We’re well on our way because the project has obtained an overwhelming majority of the easements, now has Public Service Commission approval, and now has a legislative framework,” said Petty.

“Invenergy has always been more than generous to the farmers with their compensation for access to their property. Its supported the generous compensation spelled out in a legislative compromise that was reached in 2021,” said Petty of Kirkwood Electric.

“While a few farmers still remain skeptical about Invenergy’s intention to make this a win-win situation for all, over 70% of the landowners and a majority of folks do understand it and are on board,” Petty added.

... Grain Belt Express, which has scored some recent successes.

...Chicago-based Invenergy, which has now navigated objections to the line from rural legislators and groups like the Missouri Farm Bureau.

State legislators with ties to the fossil fuel industry have opposed the wind energy project. Farm groups also have fought the project for years over opposition to the use of eminent domain for siting of transmission towers.

Some rural landowners and farmers supported legislation meant to derail the project, including one proposal that would have given county commissions veto power over transmission projects. Farmers wanted more money for land acquisition, and resulting legislation could have killed the project.

According to Petty, Missouri cities like Hannibal, Springfield and Kirkwood have supported the energy project for years. He said everyone is “jumping on the bandwagon now” and the cleaner, cheaper energy for Missouri will save money for homeowners and businesses.

“While a few farmers still remain skeptical about Invenergy’s intention to make this a win-win situation for all, over 70% of the landowners and a majority of folks do understand it and are on board,” Petty added.

According to Petty, it’s just a matter a time before everyone will be on the same page with the Grain Belt project.

“If the design and engineering of the project is materially different from how the Project is presented in Grain Belt Express Clean Line LLC’s Application, Grain Belt Express Clean Line LLC must file an updated application with the Commission for further Commission Review and determination.”

Grain Belt Express sought waiver of the requirement to file notice 60 days in advance, explaining that it filed the Notice of Intent as soon as practical after the finalization and public announcement of the proposed modifications to the Project.

Between the effective date of the Report and Order on Remand in Case No. EA-2016-0358 (i.e. April 19, 2019) and the end of the two year period established by Section 393.170.3 RSMo and referenced by 20 CSR 4240-20.045(2)(D) (i.e. April 19, 2021), Grain Belt Express conducted the following activities in exercise of its certificate of convenience and necessity (“CCN”).

1.  Constructing access roads of approximately 800 feet in total with such work commencing on April 9, 2021 at approximately State Hwy C & County Rd 141, Braymer, MO 64624 in Caldwell County and April 12, 2021 at approximately Hwy 3, Huntsville, MO 65259 in Randolph County.

2.  Installing foundations for transmission towers on property owned in fee simple in Chariton County at approximately Allen Rd & St. Joseph Ave, Keytesville, MO 65261 and Clinton County at approximately NE 280th St & NE Estep Rd, Turney, MO 64493, with such work commencing on April 13, 2021 in both counties and completed on April 17 and 20, 2021, respectively.

Previous winners of the Ripple of Hope Award include Stacey Abrams, former Vice President Joe Biden, Bono, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, former President Bill Clinton, George Clooney, Tim Cook, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Amanda Gorman, Vice President Kamala Harris, Dolores Huerta, Colin Kaepernick, late Congressman John Lewis, former President Barack Obama, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Desmond Tutu.

"Robert F. Kennedy's vision of a better world spanned all areas and industries – he understood that advancing human rights and social justice requires investment in everything from education to energy and the environment," said Polsky. "I'm honored to receive this award and look forward to growing Invenergy's impact as we fulfill our mission as innovators building a sustainable world."
Shaped by Polsky's philanthropic values, Invenergy invests heavily in project communities through an impact program. His humble roots ignited a commitment by him and his family to giving back to many causes including education, entrepreneurship, climate and sustainability, healthcare, women's rights, immigration, veterans, and arts and culture. Most recently, Polsky's philanthropic efforts have been focused on his native Ukraine to ensure the well-being of Ukraine's people, the nation's victory, and ultimate reconstruction. 
The Ripple of Hope Award is inspired by Robert F. Kennedy's most famous speech, the 1966 Day of Affirmation address he gave in South Africa at the height of apartheid: "Each time a man stands up for an ideal or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring those ripples to build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance."

Smith says it is unfair for farmers to have their land used against their consent when they are the ones who have maintained the land for decades. 

"They weren't here when we were bringing in the crops in the fall," Smith said. "They weren't here when my family was bringing in the cows and vaccinating them. They weren't here for planting."

...farmers have earned the right to manage their land as they see fit. “We like to be able to look out at see this without any big power lines,” Smith said.

"Some farmers are not necessarily going to want this going across their farms, but others are going to welcome the opportunity because they could make some additional money for the rights of way," McCarty said.

"If you ask any farmer, they will tell you they can't pay me enough to put that line through my farm," Smith said. 

"And also understand that it may help them get out of a jam if they’re able to get power from that source when otherwise they wouldn’t be able to."

McCarty says projects like the Grain Belt Express are necessities to several parts of the community. 

"Electricity is an essential commodity," McCarty said. "We have to have it to run our farms, we have to have it to run our businesses, we have to have it in our homes."

The Tiger Connector would expand the reach of the Grain Belt Express in Missouri by bringing power from the main line in northern Missouri to the McCredie Substation in Callaway County, which would send that energy out to thousands more Missouri homes and businesses. 

It’s not just state regulatory authorities that reject transmission projects when they don’t see a benefit. Ranchers and other local landowners are sometimes put off by how these (admittedly hulking) metal constructs will look on their property. The lines can be buried underground—or even underwater—but it’s more expensive. Everybody has a price, and you might just as easily find success paying the landowner what you would’ve spent burying the line.

That makes using existing infrastructure corridors so enticing. We’ve already got tracts of land connecting different parts of the country that are pre-approved for public works projects, like highways and railroads. If we could layer in transmission lines, it would avoid a lot of these land-use conflicts. We could also use existing electricity corridors to pump through a lot more power using modern technology. Issues remain: Our roadways are usually designed with shoulders where people can regain control of their cars if they veer off the road, which doesn’t always leave room for power lines. But many places, such as along railroads, should have sufficient capacity. You could run high voltage, direct current lines through those areas to high-population centers in need of clean energy.

And the most productive solar and wind farms will not be located right next door to our population centers. Broadly speaking, they’ll be in more rural areas in the middle of the country, while the majority of people live on the coasts. Many of the rest live in metro areas inland. We need to move clean power from the places where we’ll harvest the bulk of it to the places where we’ll consume the bulk of it.

“Transmission, these big regional lines, often have benefit-cost ratios of 2:1 or 3:1, and that's because you can access resources that are on really low-cost land. Sometimes these solar and wind plants produce twice as much power at a given location than if you get closer to [where it’s used].”

​In practice, these lines would primarily carry energy from the center of the country—between Texas and North Dakota, where the wind really blows—to the East.  Others would carry energy from solar facilities in the South—particularly the Southwest, but also the Southeast—northwards.

The old environmental movement was about stopping things from getting built. The new environmental movement's about building stuff.

The fix is to make it easier to build large transmission lines in anticipation of need, like an interstate highway, and allow power markets to spring up near them like communities along the road. Sen. Joe Manchin’s larger permitting reform bill goes some way in this direction, making it easier to site these lines and setting time limits for the environmental review and stakeholder comment periods. (It would do the same for fossil-fuel projects, which climate activists are not happy about. The bill is on hold after Manchin agreed to pull it from a larger funding bill at the end of September.) The bill would develop predefined corridors where this stuff can go on federal land and make it easier to create these corridors in general. Finally, Gramlich says, it will help with cost allocation, creating a regulatory framework to recover the upfront cost of these large interstate lines.

Keeping the lights on is a matter of life and death, and so is transforming our energy system.