Post: USA Market: DoE launches “Building a Better Grid” initiative

USA Market: DoE launches “Building a Better Grid” initiative

The “Building a Better Grid” Initiative has been launched by the US Department of Energy (DoE) to speed up the modernisation of the country’s energy transmission infrastructure.

Unveiled on 11 January, the aim is to make sure energy goals set under President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law are met, help the US to meet its goal of having 100% clean energy by 2035 and achieving a zero-emissions economy by 2050, and to enhance the resilience of the US grid against climate change.

The initiative will support the upgrading of existing and development of new long-distance and high voltage transmission lines and will enable more than $20B in federal funding to be directed the modernisation of the network: Up to $2.5B will be sourced from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, $3B will be directed towards the expansion of the Smart Grid Investment Grant Programme and more than $10B in grants issued to states and utilities for grid resilience initiatives.

The project will enable collaboration between the DoE, states, tribal nations and utilities, communities and industry stakeholders to identify transmissions needs and on the development of high-capacity lines that will be able to transport increasing amounts of renewables as more and more distributed resources are deployed across the US.

GridBeyond VP for North America Wayne Muncaster said: