> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://pvweekly.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # FERC told transmission planners to look 20 years ahead—and explain who should pay - URL: https://pvweekly.com/ferc-order-1920-transmission-planning/ - Published: 2026-10-27T19:29:56.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-27T19:29:56.000Z - Description: 2024 archive · Order 1920 changed the regional planning process in 2024, requiring multiple future scenarios and broader benefit calculations before choosing long-term grid investments. - Author: PV Weekly Editorial - Tags: Grids & markets, Archive 2024, #ledger-format, #archive-backfill-20261027 **2024 archive** · May 13, 2024Reporting prepared October 22, 2026\. This retrospective describes events and expectations from the period covered.[Browse the archive](https://pvweekly.com/archive/) The cheapest response to an immediate grid problem can be the wrong investment for the next two decades. That was the central concern behind FERC's Order 1920, adopted on May 13, 2024: regional transmission planning needed to consider a longer future before committing customers to infrastructure costs. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission found that existing processes too often produced piecemeal responses to relatively near-term needs. Its new rule required a regional plan looking ahead at least 20 years, refreshed at least once every five years, using a minimum of three plausible and distinct scenarios. Three scenarios were not three predictions that could all come true. They were a way to test prospective facilities against different combinations of future conditions. A line that proved useful across those conditions could present a different case from one whose value depended heavily on a single forecast. That changed the work expected of transmission providers. They had to identify long-term needs, evaluate possible facilities and establish transparent criteria for selecting projects. The process also required consideration of grid-enhancing options such as advanced conductors and dynamic line ratings, rather than treating every need as an automatic case for a new line. ## Count more than the first problem a line solves FERC specified seven economic and reliability benefits to measure in evaluating long-term regional facilities. These included avoided or deferred reliability projects and aging-infrastructure replacement, production-cost savings, reduced electrical losses, and less congestion during transmission outages. Other categories addressed reliability, extreme conditions and capacity costs associated with peak losses. The practical point was to evaluate several functions together. Transmission can connect supply to demand in ordinary conditions, provide options during an outage and reduce the need for another investment. Looking at only one function risks understating the value of a regional project; counting several requires care to identify what each benefit actually represents. The order also directed attention to equipment already due for replacement. Increasing transfer capability during that work—what FERC called “right-sizing”—could offer an opportunity to address future needs while replacing aging facilities. The rule required providers to identify such opportunities, not to assume every replacement justified a larger asset. ## Planning and payment had to fit together A regional project can provide benefits across several utility territories. That makes the allocation of costs part of the planning problem, rather than a detail to settle after a line is selected. Order 1920 required proposed default allocation methods and a period of engagement with relevant state entities before compliance filings. States gained a stronger role later that year. In Order 1920-A, issued November 21, FERC required providers to incorporate state input into scenario development and to submit state-agreed cost-allocation approaches for the commission's consideration, even when the provider proposed a different method. States could also request additional scenarios to inform their payment discussions. Those changes did not turn the rule into approval of a particular transmission route. Nor did they establish that a forecast benefit had already lowered customer bills. They altered the process through which providers would identify projects, compare value and propose how costs should be shared. The 2024 reform's concrete contribution was that framework: a longer horizon, recurring analysis and an explicit connection between benefits and payment. Whether it produced more useful infrastructure would depend on the plans, project choices and implementation that followed. ## Sources - [Fact Sheet: Building for the Future Through Electric Regional Transmission Planning and Cost Allocation](https://www.ferc.gov/news-events/news/fact-sheet-building-future-through-electric-regional-transmission-planning-and?ref=pvweekly.com) — Federal Energy Regulatory Commission · 2024-05-13. - [Staff Presentation: Building for the Future Through Electric Regional Transmission Planning and Cost Allocation](https://www.ferc.gov/news-events/news/staff-presentation-building-future-through-electric-regional-transmission-planning?ref=pvweekly.com) — Federal Energy Regulatory Commission · 2024-05-13. - [Presentation: Order No. 1920-A](https://www.ferc.gov/news-events/news/presentation-order-no-1920-building-future-through-electric-regional-transmission?ref=pvweekly.com) — Federal Energy Regulatory Commission · 2024-11-21.