Why Transmission Pricing Reform Must Accelerate Deployment of Advanced Grid Technologies
The recently released report, Federal Transmission Pricing Volume 1: The Evolution of Current Policies and Practices, authored by Gretchen Kershaw, John D. Wilson, Rob Gramlich, and Sophie Meyer of Grid Strategies, represents one of the most thoughtful and timely examinations of transmission pricing policy published in recent years.
CTC Global commends the authors, Grid Strategies, the Electricity Customer Alliance, Americans for a Clean Energy Grid, policymakers, regulators, utilities, regional transmission organizations, and the many industry stakeholders contributing to these increasingly important discussions around transmission investment, affordability, and reliability.
The report arrives at a pivotal moment for the electric power industry.
Across the United States and around the world, the electric grid is confronting a historic convergence of challenges:
- explosive AI and hyperscale data center growth,
- industrial electrification,
- accelerated manufacturing investment,
- rising electrification of transportation,
- renewable energy integration,
- wildfire resilience concerns,
- aging infrastructure,
- and unprecedented reliability expectations.
At the center of all of these issues lies a common constraint: transmission capacity.
The Grid Strategies report appropriately frames transmission not simply as an engineering issue, but as a national economic and policy imperative. Its central message is both clear and encouraging: rather than viewing rising electricity demand as a threat, policymakers and regulators should recognize the opportunity to modernize and expand the grid while protecting consumers and enabling economic growth.
That perspective is critically important.
For decades, transmission development has often been constrained by permitting complexity, cost allocation disputes, lengthy development timelines, and concerns over ratepayer impacts. Meanwhile, demand forecasts have shifted dramatically upward. As highlighted in the report, nationwide summer peak demand growth projections have accelerated substantially in only a few years, driven primarily by hyperscale data centers and industrial expansion.
The reality is increasingly undeniable: The traditional pace of transmission development is no longer sufficient to support the emerging energy economy.
Fortunately, the industry already possesses many of the technologies needed to address this challenge.
Grid Enhancing Technologies (GETs), advanced monitoring systems, dynamic line ratings, topology optimization tools, advanced power flow controls, and high-performance advanced conductors all provide pathways to substantially increase grid capacity faster, more affordably, and with far less permitting risk than traditional greenfield transmission construction alone.
Among these solutions, advanced conductors deserve particular attention.
High-performance advanced conductors such as CTC Global’s ACCC® Conductor technology enable utilities to dramatically increase transmission capacity using existing transmission corridors and structures. In many cases, reconductoring projects can double transmission capacity while reducing line losses, improving reliability, mitigating thermal constraints, and avoiding the lengthy permitting and right-of-way challenges associated with entirely new transmission lines.
This is especially significant given the urgency emphasized throughout the report.
The report repeatedly underscores the importance of balancing three objectives:
- maintaining reliability,
- protecting affordability for existing consumers,
- and enabling urgently needed infrastructure expansion.
Advanced conductors directly support all three.
First, they improve reliability and operational resilience by increasing thermal performance and reducing sag under high-load conditions.
Second, they support affordability by maximizing the utilization of existing infrastructure and reducing the need for expensive new corridors.
Third, they accelerate deployment timelines, allowing utilities to respond to rapidly emerging load growth far more quickly than traditional transmission construction schedules typically allow.
Equally important, the report’s discussion of “beneficiary pays” and “cost causation” principles aligns closely with the measurable system benefits that advanced transmission technologies provide.
Advanced conductors and GETs produce quantifiable value:
- increased transfer capability,
- congestion reduction,
- renewable integration,
- lower losses,
- enhanced reliability,
- deferred infrastructure spending,
- and improved asset utilization.
These are precisely the kinds of measurable system-wide benefits that modern transmission planning and pricing frameworks increasingly seek to recognize.
The evolution of FERC policy described throughout the report – including Orders 888, 890, 1000, and 1920 – also reflects a broader transition toward regional planning, transmission efficiency, and long-term infrastructure optimization.
That transition creates a tremendous opportunity.
The industry no longer needs to view transmission expansion as a choice between:
- slow, difficult greenfield construction,
or - accepting growing congestion and reliability risks.
Instead, a new hybrid model is emerging:
one that combines new transmission construction where necessary with aggressive deployment of advanced technologies capable of unlocking substantially more capacity from the existing grid.
This approach is not theoretical.
Utilities around the world are already deploying advanced conductors to:
- integrate renewable generation,
- relieve congestion,
- increase import capability,
- support data center growth,
- improve wildfire resilience,
- and defer major capital expenditures.
The challenge now is speed and scale.
The policy discussions highlighted in the Grid Strategies report must increasingly translate into accelerated implementation.
The industry cannot afford to spend another decade debating solutions that are already technically proven and commercially available.
As electricity demand accelerates, the urgency of deploying advanced transmission technologies is becoming increasingly acute. The grid modernization conversation can no longer focus solely on long-term planning horizons. It must also prioritize immediate, deployable solutions capable of increasing capacity within the next several years.
That is precisely where advanced conductors, GETs, and digital transmission technologies can play an indispensable role.
CTC Global applauds the authors of this important report, as well as the organizations and stakeholders helping advance these critically important conversations. The electric industry is entering a transformative era, and thoughtful policy leadership will be essential to ensuring that grid investment remains fair, affordable, reliable, and sufficiently ambitious to meet the demands of the future.
The opportunity before us is extraordinary.
With the right regulatory frameworks, planning processes, and deployment strategies, the industry can modernize the grid faster, more efficiently, and more affordably than many once believed possible.
But achieving that outcome will require urgency – and a willingness to deploy the advanced technologies already available today, including high-performance advanced conductors such as ACCC® Conductor technology.
