Good morning. West Virginia eagerly answered the DOE’s call to host a nuclear research and manufacturing hub—until state officials learned what it actually entails. When they realized that the initiative requires storing spent fuel, WV dropped its bid. But as they say, one man’s radioactive trash is another man’s treasure?
— Molly, Carrie, and the Energy Central editorial team
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Is undergrounding worth it? These utilities are betting on it.
A map of major US undergrounding projects.
It was a moment nearly two decades in the making: This May, North America’s longest fully buried power line broke onto the scene…and it had a rough first few months. Now, the 339-mile Champlain Hudson Power Express (CHPE) delivers 1.3 GW of hydropower from Québec to NYC.
Clearly, pulling off massive undergrounding projects like CHPE proves no small feat—but these could become increasingly vital in the coming years.
The trend: Buried lines are nothing new, but large-scale undergrounding projects have growing appeal thanks to intensifying extreme weather and wildfire threats and recent tech advancements.
“Now, you see utilities that hadn't dreamed about doing undergrounding actually looking at it,” Mike Beehler, a transmission engineer and former VP at consulting firm Burns & McDonnell, told Energy Central.
Cutting-edge drilling equipment can get the job done cheaper and more quickly, Beehler said, and modern high-voltage lines take up a smaller footprint, lowering right-of-way costs. And as of 2022, buried cable costs had dropped from >$3M to $1-2M per GW-mile.
The lineup: A handful of interregional undergrounding projects are now in the works, including the 2.1-GW, 350-mile SOO Green HVDC Link project that’s planned to connect MISO and PJM territory.
Utilities are also spearheading ambitious builds in their footprints, including Dominion’s proposed 200-mile high-voltage line planned to serve Data Center Alley. Over in California, PG&E just floated a plan to build 5K miles of underground lines from 2028-2037, and estimates over $110B in long-term benefits from avoided fires and outages. And to maintain resilience during storms, Florida Power & Light has installed 2K miles of underground lines throughout the state.
These orgs aren’t alone. In a recent S&C Electric Company-sponsored survey of utility and energy industry pros, 41% of respondents said they expect undergrounding to drive the most growth in distribution investment over the next five years.
But are these lines worth it in the long run? Let’s dig in.🍴
The benefits:
Increased resilience: Burying lines protects them from a long list of hazards—including ice storms, wildfires, and, of course, rodents—all of which can lead to costly outages.
Easier permitting: Underground lines can often run through existing rights of way.
Cost savings: These projects can reduce expenses elsewhere. For example, they can curb the need for new power plants or local transmission.
The drawbacks:
High price tags: Despite recent advancements, burying transmission lines can still cost 10-20X more than building overhead lines, according to Xcel Energy’s 2024 numbers.
Temp troubles: Restarting after a blackout is trickier with buried lines, since they need to be actively cooled. And because these lines face higher risks of overheating, they can only transport so much power.
Long repair times: It can take weeks or months to locate and repair damaged underground lines, per Xcel.
The bottom line: As customers face quickly rising rates, careful cost-benefit analysis is key here, Seth Kaplan, VP of consulting firm Grid Strategies, told us. “The fundamental question is always: Is the juice worth the squeeze?” 🧃
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PJM has wrapped up weeks of negotiations over governance reforms…and a key conflict remains.
The background: As we all know, PJM is struggling to lower capacity prices and clear its interconnection queue. That’s why FERC gave PJM two months to fix its fraught decision-making process, which states claim favors industry members like utilities and generators.
The latest: On Wednesday, these industry members voted for a proposal that would further increase their power at states’ expense, according to Jameson Tweedie, public advocate for the state of Delaware. “This has failed the task presented by FERC,” Tweedie wrote on LinkedIn. “It has also failed the interests of the customers and states PJM serves.”
A closer look: This plan will expand members’ filing rights and position states as “third-tier participants,” state officials wrote in a letter to Paula Conboy, chair of the PJM Board of Managers.
While we’re here: PJM recently launched the initial review phase of its “first-ready, first-served” interconnection process, which includes around 80 GW of natural gas, 50 GW of storage, 18 GW of nuclear, and 9.4 GW of solar.
Amazon is buying 690 MW of nuclear from Constellation—and funding a 190-MW capacity boost.
The deal: Amazon signed a 20-year PPA for Constellation’s 1.8-GW Calvert Cliffs nuclear plant in Maryland. This will help the company 1) relicense the plant for two more decades 2) invest $3B in “state-of-the-art improvements,” and 3) possibly add SMRs to the site. Over the next few years, agreement will enable the plant to tack on another 190 MW.
Where the new energy’s headed: Like Calvert Cliffs’s current capacity, the additional electrons will flow throughout the PJM region—an Amazon data center hotspot.
In other nuclear news: Valar Atomics wants to build over 400 SMRs on BLM land in Utah, along with nuclear fuel production and waste storage facilities. These reactors could churn out a total of 9.6 GW for data centers—more than 2x the energy produced by the entire state, on average. The Utah BLM office is now reviewing Valar’s application.
California Gov. Newsom has inked bills to legalize balcony solar and bolster VPPs.
Soak up the sun: CA recently became the tenth state to permit balcony solar, enabling residents to plug in UL-certified panels starting next year (but the legislation expires in 2030). Newsom also signed bills that will support the state’s VPP rollout.
North Carolina Electric Cooperative is hiring a manager for reliability compliance.
Tipmont is hiring a CEO.
Carroll Electric Cooperative Corporation is hiring a VP of engineering and operations.
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Thanks for reading. Enjoy your weekend!