This year will be decisive for the buildout of transformative energy infrastructure in Michigan. Most Michiganders may be unaware, but billions of dollars in lower energy costs are at play with the future of two new transmission lines soon to be proposed by the electric transmission utility, ITC.
The projects are Michigan's portion of a 2,000-mile set of high-voltage, overhead electric transmission lines that, if built, will crisscross the Midwest, connecting sources of power – chiefly, renewable energy installations – to energy demand.
About 100 miles of the planned transmission buildout would come from two proposed lines, and the Michigan Public Service Commission is considering those lines for approval this year.
The transmission network is like a congested road system. While essential to our daily lives, the process of building transmission lines happens infrequently in this country. Michigan, for example, hasn’t had an interstate transmission line built in about 50 years. Imagine the state of disarray our highways would be in if the interstate highway system hadn’t been expanded and improved for half a century.
The stakes are big enough that a diverse coalition has come together in favor of the projects, including the Michigan Energy Innovation Business Council, a trade group representing clean energy companies, and the Citizens Utility Board of Michigan, which advocates on behalf of residential utility ratepayers.
The lines would serve utility customers within the region of the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), the entity that operates the electric grid for most of central North America. MISO’s grid includes the service territories of Michigan’s two major electric utilities, DTE and Consumers Energy, but those utilities do not own transmission. Like other transmission lines in Michigan, these new lines would be owned by ITC Holdings Corp., through its subsidiaries ITC Transmission and Michigan Electric Transmission Company.
MISO planned the new lines in response to profound, ongoing changes in energy in the region as sources of power increasingly shift from natural gas and coal to renewable energy and energy storage. MISO identified dozens of locations in the region where existing transmission lines are getting close to being overloaded, leading to less efficient transfers of energy and raising the threat down the road of insufficient power in severe weather situations.
Reducing congestion on the transmission network not only deals with these problems but also opens up conduits to bring new sources of clean energy online. Wind and solar installations that would otherwise not be able to connect to the grid can now be built.
The result would ultimately be lower electric bills across the region for multiple reasons: wind and solar don’t burn fuel, so costs would go down with less reliance on natural gas and coal plants. In addition, a significant amount of electricity that is currently generated is simply lost because there is nowhere for it to go, but new transmission means fewer electrons go to waste.
The cost savings generated by these benefits far outweigh the over $1 billion in costs of building the lines themselves. Those costs are passed on to utility ratepayers, but net costs would go down for ratepayers, according to estimates from MISO that estimate Michigan’s share of savings from the new transmission lines at $3.4 billion over 20 years.
MISO has said it expects this first phase of its long-range transmission plan, commonly known as Tranche 1, will facilitate the building of 56 gigawatts of new wind and solar capacity. By comparison, the total capacity of all power sources across MISO’s massive geographic footprint is currently a little over 63 gigawatts.
For Michigan, one transmission line would go from the existing Oneida substation about 13 miles west of Lansing and travel north 40 miles to the existing Nelson Road substation in Gratiot County. The other new line would be built from the Indiana/Michigan border in Branch County 50 miles north to a new substation in northeastern Calhoun County. These lines would be built by 2030 – if construction proceeds on time.
The need for these lines to spur new energy development was made clear in a 2021 letter sent by the governors of Michigan, Illinois, Minnesota and Wisconsin to MISO. Tranche 1 “is urgently needed to allow carbon-free and low-cost electricity to flow across the region – all while maintaining the reliability of the system on which we rely,” the letter said.
Transmission is one of the least recognized parts of our energy system, but also one of the most important. An initial draft of MISO’s proposed Tranche 2 interregional projects was released on March 15, with additional lines proposed to be constructed in the state in the future.
As these projects progress, Michiganders should understand this: How their energy gets to their homes and businesses is just as important as from where it comes.
Amy Bandyk is executive director of the Citizens Utility Board of Michigan. Natalie Lyijynen is sustainable business associate of the Michigan Energy Innovation Business Council.
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