Feb 18, 2026
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Three Independent Reports, One Clear Message: Why Linking Grid Regions Is the Way to Reliable, Affordable American Energy
by Patrick Whitty, Senior Vice President, Transmission Public Affairs
In the midst of Winter Storm Fern and its nationwide impact on America’s aging grid, three independent reports—each from a different perspective—arrived at the same conclusion: America’s energy future depends on building a more connected, interregional grid.
The North American Electric Reliability Corporation’s (NERC) 2025 Long-Term Reliability Assessment, a new Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) analysis on the value of interregional transmission, and the Electricity Customer Alliance’s “Customer-Centric Agenda for FERC” whitepaper all point to the same realities. Reliability risks are rising. Electricity demand is accelerating. Costs are increasing. And the traditional, fragmented approach to grid planning is no longer sufficient.
Together, these reports reinforce a simple truth: our grid challenges are national in scale—and so must be the solutions. Interregional transmission connects the country, creating a reliability shield against extreme weather and creating more efficient power markets to deliver energy affordability to American homes and businesses across geographic regions.
Reliability Is Becoming a National Challenge
NERC’s Long-Term Reliability Assessment is the electric sector’s most authoritative independent evaluation of grid reliability. This year’s findings are unambiguous. Electricity demand is rising faster than at any point in the past two decades, driven by data centers, artificial intelligence, electrification, and advanced manufacturing.
NERC concludes that reliability risks are increasing across much of the country, with more than half of the regions facing elevated or high risk over the next decade. Importantly, these risks are structural—not temporary. They reflect long-term shifts in demand, infrastructure, and system design.
Transmission sits at the center of this challenge. While NERC notes an increase in transmission planning activity, it also finds that most new projects remain focused within individual regions. Interregional transmission—lines that connect major grid systems—are only 4% of planned projects (an actual decrease from 6% last year), even though NERC identifies cross-regional transfer capability as essential for geographic diversity, system resilience, and reliability during extreme events like Winter Storm Fern.
The System Value of Interregional Connectivity
The new LBNL report complements NERC’s reliability analysis with a system-level economic perspective. LBNL’s research highlights the broad value created by interregional transmission, including improved reliability, enhanced resilience, reduced congestion, greater resource diversity, and long-term cost savings for American consumers.
By enabling power to move from resource-rich regions to major load centers, interregional transmission improves system efficiency. By linking regions with different weather patterns and generation profiles, interregional transmission reduces exposure to correlated risks. And by expanding transfer capability across markets, interregional transmission creates operational flexibility that isolated regional systems cannot provide.
The bottom line? The LBNL study finds interregional electricity transfers saved $1.2 billion per year by moving energy from lower to higher-priced regions.
A Customer-Centric Energy System
The Electricity Customer Alliance’s new whitepaper adds a third, equally important dimension to this conversation: customer affordability.
The report highlights that rising electricity demand, outdated regulatory structures, and misaligned infrastructure investment are driving costs higher for American families and businesses. It warns of an emerging affordability crisis if grid investments are not structured to protect consumers from unnecessary cost burdens.
At the same time, the report makes a critical point: new large customers—particularly data centers and advanced manufacturing—represent an opportunity, not just a challenge. When integrated properly, these customers can help spread the fixed costs of the grid across more users, putting downward pressure on rates.
The report calls for a customer-centric approach to grid development, emphasizing that infrastructure investments should protect existing ratepayers, leverage private capital where possible, and prioritize affordability alongside reliability.
It also specifically calls for moving forward on interregional transmission, and notes that sharp increases in the transmission portion of customer bills are driven “in significant part by spending on smaller, local transmission projects.”
Grain Belt Express Is Designed for This Moment
Taken together, these three reports—from NERC, LBNL, and the Electricity Customer Alliance—deliver a consistent message:
- Reliability challenges are accelerating
- Demand growth is national in scale
- Grid risks are increasingly systemic
- Infrastructure must be built efficiently and responsibly
- Affordability must be protected
- Interregional connectivity is essential
Invenergy’s Grain Belt Express (GBX) is a high-capacity, interregional transmission line connecting the Southwest Power Pool (SPP), Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), and PJM Interconnection (PJM). In this footprint, NERC identifies rapidly escalating risks.
GBX solves America’s growing grid need as a customer-funded, merchant project—meaning it is paid for by the customers who use it. By relying on private capital and customer commitments, not taxpayer funding, GBX aligns with a private-sector-led, customer-centric model of grid development. GBX supports reliability without shifting costs onto U.S. families and small businesses, while delivering broader system benefits through stronger interregional connectivity and more efficient power flows.
Building A Secure, Affordable American Grid
The convergence of findings from NERC, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, and the Electricity Customer Alliance sends a powerful signal to energy policymakers, regulators, and stakeholders. The grid must be more connected. A connected American grid is more resilient and more reliable, but it must be built in a way that protects customers and promotes affordability.
Interregional transmission infrastructure is no longer a “nice to have” in America—it’s a “must have.”
GBX is state-of-the-art energy infrastructure: customer-funded, reliability-driven, interregional in scope, and designed to fuel American competitiveness and serve American consumers.
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