Accelerate the US high-capacity transmission build-out with voluntary, strategic co-location

Attempts to pass comprehensive transmission siting reform failed in the recent congressional debt ceiling negotiations. It may be time to explore a different approach to accelerating transmission build-out: encouraging voluntary efforts by developers and stakeholders to create stakeholder-driven transmission corridors. Under this model, identifying transmission routes is an exercise in strategically co-locating transmission with one or more other forms of “linear infrastructure” like broadband, prairie strips or bike trails. Developers would identify the specific route of new high-capacity transmission lines based on landowners’ willingness to host transmission in exchange for access to valuable co-located infrastructure. Routes would mostly traverse rural areas, which often have unmet needs for broadband connectivity for telehealth, online learning and precision agriculture, among other uses. Unmet rural connectivity needs may provide a nexus for building support for high-capacity transmission by letting rural middle-mile broadband demands drive the specific route of new high-capacity transmission. Several conditions make this siting strategy feasible: 

1. Transmission corridor designs can be flexible.
2. Co-location of broadband with a high-capacity transmission line is feasible and inexpensive.
3. Online maps can facilitate the identification of potential willing landowners.
4. Communities that have broadband might want redundancy.

[Robin Allen is a climate fellow at the Niskanen Center]