I
119THCONGRESS
1
STSESSION H. R. 603
To direct the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to improve interregional
electricity transfer capability between immediately adjacent transmission
planning regions, and for other purposes.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
JANUARY22, 2025
Mr. C
ASTENintroduced the following bill; which was referred to the
Committee on Energy and Commerce
A BILL
To direct the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to
improve interregional electricity transfer capability be-
tween immediately adjacent transmission planning re-
gions, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Reinforcing the Grid 4
Against Extreme Weather Act of 2025’’. 5
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SEC. 2. IMPROVING INTERREGIONAL ELECTRICITY TRANS-1
FER CAPABILITY. 2
Part II of the Federal Power Act (16 U.S.C. 824 et 3
seq.) is amended by adding at the end the following: 4
‘‘SEC. 224. IMPROVING INTERREGIONAL ELECTRICITY 5
TRANSFER CAPABILITY. 6
‘‘(a) R
ULEMAKING.—Not later than 24 months after 7
the date of enactment of this section, the Commission 8
shall issue regulations to establish a process for— 9
‘‘(1) calculating existing transfer capability be-10
tween each transmission planning region and its im-11
mediately adjacent transmission planning region, 12
such that— 13
‘‘(A) each transmission planning entity for 14
a given transmission planning region and the 15
transmission planning entities for any imme-16
diately adjacent transmission planning region 17
shall use the same method to calculate the 18
transfer capability between them; and 19
‘‘(B) each shared method of calculation 20
shall comply with requirements established by 21
the Commission; 22
‘‘(2) determining a minimum transfer capability 23
between each transmission planning region and its 24
immediately adjacent transmission planning region 25
in order to— 26
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‘‘(A) ensure that each transmission plan-1
ning region has sufficient electric transfer capa-2
bility with immediately adjacent transmission 3
planning regions to ensure reliability during im-4
pacts associated with weather events, physical 5
events, or cyberattacks to the transmission 6
planning region; and 7
‘‘(B) optimize achievement of the trans-8
mission benefits; 9
‘‘(3) identifying, selecting, and allocating costs 10
for individual interregional transmission projects 11
needed to achieve each minimum transfer capability 12
identified pursuant to paragraph (2); and 13
‘‘(4) preventing the disclosure of information 14
pertaining to cyberattacks that may compromise the 15
security of the electricity system. 16
‘‘(b) F
ILING APLAN.— 17
‘‘(1) I
N GENERAL.—Not later than 3 years 18
after the date of enactment of this section, and at 19
least every 5 years thereafter, the transmission plan-20
ning entities for each pair of immediately adjacent 21
transmission planning regions shall file with the 22
Commission, and receive approval for, a plan that, 23
in accordance with the regulations issued under sub-24
section (a)— 25
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‘‘(A) evaluates and selects interregional 1
transmission projects based on consideration of 2
the transmission benefits; and 3
‘‘(B) achieves minimum interregional 4
transfer capability. 5
‘‘(2) D
UTY OF COMMISSION.—The Commission 6
shall approve or deny a plan filed pursuant to para-7
graph (1) in consideration of the factors described in 8
subsection (a)(2). 9
‘‘(c) R
EPORT.—Not later than 48 months after the 10
date on which the regulations are issued pursuant to sub-11
section (a), and annually thereafter, the Commission shall 12
publish in the Federal Register a report on the results 13
of implementing this section. 14
‘‘(d) D
EFINITIONS.—In this section: 15
‘‘(1) G
REENHOUSE GAS.—The term ‘greenhouse 16
gas’ includes each of the following: 17
‘‘(A) Carbon dioxide. 18
‘‘(B) Methane. 19
‘‘(C) Nitrous oxide. 20
‘‘(D) Sulfur hexafluoride. 21
‘‘(E) Any hydrofluorocarbon. 22
‘‘(F) Any perfluorocarbon. 23
‘‘(G) Nitrogen trifluoride. 24
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‘‘(H) Any fully fluorinated linear, 1
branched, or cyclic— 2
‘‘(i) alkane; 3
‘‘(ii) ether; 4
‘‘(iii) tertiary amine; or 5
‘‘(iv) amino ether. 6
‘‘(I) Any perfluoropolyether. 7
‘‘(J) Any hydrofluoropolyether. 8
‘‘(K) Any other fluorocarbon, except for a 9
fluorocarbon with a vapor pressure of less than 10
1 mm of Hg absolute at 25 degrees Celsius. 11
‘‘(2) T
RANSMISSION BENEFIT .—The term 12
‘transmission benefit’ means a broad range of eco-13
nomic, operational, safety, security, resilience, public 14
policy, environmental, and other reasonably antici-15
pated benefit of constructing, modifying, or oper-16
ating a transmission facility, including any benefit 17
realized when real-time energy prices and oper-18
ational conditions differ from those anticipated in 19
the 48-hour ahead or day-ahead time frame. Such 20
benefits include— 21
‘‘(A) improved reliability; 22
‘‘(B) improved resilience; 23
‘‘(C) improved safety; 24
‘‘(D) reduced congestion; 25
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‘‘(E) reduced power losses; 1
‘‘(F) greater carrying capacity; 2
‘‘(G) reduced operating reserve require-3
ments; 4
‘‘(H) improved access to lower-cost elec-5
tricity generation; 6
‘‘(I) improved access to electricity gener-7
ating facilities with no direct emissions of 8
greenhouse gases; 9
‘‘(J) improved public health from the clo-10
sure of electricity generation facilities that emit 11
harmful pollution; 12
‘‘(K) increased competition and market li-13
quidity in electricity markets; 14
‘‘(L) improved energy resilience and reli-15
ability of Department of Defense installations; 16
‘‘(M) optimizing use of existing trans-17
mission assets, including any existing rights of 18
way; 19
‘‘(N) other transmission costs avoided by 20
the proposed transmission solution; and 21
‘‘(O) other potential benefits of increasing 22
the interconnectedness of the electric grid. 23
‘‘(3) T
RANSMISSION PLANNING ENTITY .—The 24
term ‘transmission planning entity’ means an entity 25
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responsible for planning for the deployment of elec-1
tric transmission for a given transmission planning 2
region. 3
‘‘(4) T
RANSMISSION PLANNING REGION .—The 4
term ‘transmission planning region’ means a geo-5
graphic area that the Commission finds sufficient to 6
satisfy its requirements for the scope of regional 7
transmission planning, as established in or in com-8
pliance with the following orders issued by the Com-9
mission: 10
‘‘(A) ‘Transmission Planning and Cost Al-11
location by Transmission Owning and Oper-12
ating Public Utilities’ published in the Federal 13
Register on October 12, 2012 (77 Fed. Reg. 14
64890); and 15
‘‘(B) ‘Building for the Future Through 16
Electric Regional Transmission Planning and 17
Cost Allocation’ published in the Federal Reg-18
ister on October 24, 2012 (77 Fed. Reg. 19
64890).’’. 20
Æ
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