BAAJA 법안은 연방 규제당국에 송전 장벽을 허물 수 있는 '더 큰 망치'를 쥐여주는 내용이며, 조시 하더(Josh Harder) 민주당 하원의원(캘리포니아)은 이 법안의 비용 분담 조항이 가장 중요한 부분이라고 말했다.

The Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act encourages grid operators and stakeholders to work together to develop new electric transmission infrastructure. But federal regulators will have "a much bigger hammer to swing" at obstacles to that buildout if they determine not enough is being done, said Rep. Josh Harder, D-Calif., in an interview with Utility Dive.

Harder, chair of the Build America Caucus, is a strong supporter of BAAJA, bipartisan permitting reform legislation introduced in the Senate on Sept. 30. He said the House bipartisan Build More Agenda, announced Oct. 5, was developed alongside the Senate bill but includes additional policies intended to increase clean firm generation, such as streamlining nuclear regulation.

"I think the Trump administration has made some changes [regarding clean firm generation] that are really encouraging, but there's a lot more to do here because I think voters are going to demand it," Harder said. "They really want this type of energy, especially if it can be done at an affordable price."

BAAJA's motion to proceed is scheduled to receive a cloture vote in the Senate on Nov. 9, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center. The bill increases the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's (FERC) power by eliminating the federal right of first refusal for incumbent utilities, which strips them of their automatic right to build new regional lines. It also requires FERC to issue a rule requiring each transmission planning region to file a consolidated interconnection and regional transmission planning process.

The legislation further states that FERC can require public utilities to make cost-effective grid upgrades and determine a penalty for utilities that fail to comply within a timeline set by FERC. Potential penalties include a reduction of their return on equity.

FERC must establish "rate treatments for regional and interregional transmission planning and cost allocation," the bill says, and require tariffs that allocate the cost of doing so to the customers that benefit.

"I think the cost-sharing elements are by far probably the most important part of this bill, and my hope is that can unlock a lot more collaboration as opposed to what we have now, which is kind of folks pointing the finger at each other," Harder said. "We have seen, at least at the FERC level, essentially no new interregional transmission built in a long, long time."

"That's unacceptable," he added, "and it's just not doing the job to lower prices for folks. So I think it's going to make some folks uncomfortable, but it's absolutely necessary to incentivize transmission getting built."

**Federal 'forcing function' and funding**

Chirag Lala, vice president of research and chief economist at the nonprofit Center for Public Enterprise and co-author of a recent paper proposing a federally coordinated macrogrid, said in an October brief about BAAJA that the legislation "gets transmission right." He noted, however, that the interregional planning mechanism lacks a "'forcing function' in the event regions fail to submit a planning process — only a six-month extension, after which the outcome is unclear if no process is submitted."

Advait Arun, senior associate for energy finance at the Center for Public Enterprise and co-author of the macrogrid paper, told Utility Dive in an email that in addition to including a "forcing function," BAAJA could potentially be amended to add "more firepower" to the federal government's transmission finance programs. He cited, as an example, the U.S. Department of Energy's $2.5 billion revolving Transmission Facilitation Program fund.

Arun also suggested altering the "federal support restriction," which currently blocks DOE's Office of Energy Dominance Financing, formerly known as the Loan Programs Office, from financing projects that have already received some other kind of non-tax-credit federal commitment.

"One worry I have here is that there is no money in any of these proposals," he said of the Build More Agenda. "Ultimately, a lot of the private investment that these suggestions aim to catalyze through targeted streamlining of regulations will still be at the mercy of a temperamental macroeconomic picture."

Harder noted that the U.S. is facing a "lack of fiscal headroom that we're going to have at a national level over the next couple of years," adding, "I think that a lot of policymakers on both sides of the aisle are going to be looking for pro-growth policies that don't demand enormous new spending."

When asked whether BAAJA might be amended in the House, Harder said, "This is a pretty delicate negotiation that's gone on for over two years, and anytime you have something of this magnitude, it's certainly a little bit balanced on a knife."

Harder acknowledged that tribal organizations have voiced opposition to the changes the bill makes to the National Historic Preservation Act. He said there is "some disagreement about what they would actually mean in practice, so I think that is something that might end up being clarified. But … the vast majority of this bill, I think, will probably remain as-is."

**Expanding 'clean firm' power**

The Build More Agenda suggests expanding programs like DOE's Utah Frontier Observatory for Research in Geothermal Energy, which "has helped demonstrate a commercial pathway for enhanced geothermal." It also proposes streamlining regulations, such as requirements for nuclear plant developers to "use specialized nuclear-grade materials … in non-safety structures of a plant where using commercial-grade materials would be just as safe."

On public perception of nuclear energy safety, Harder said, "I think we've come a long way for sure, and I think one of the real pressures is that people see the cost of electricity has skyrocketed. And if we really want to electrify our economy and move it towards 100% clean energy, then nuclear — and geothermal as well, that clean, firm power — have got to be a really important bedrock."

Some moves by the Trump administration to encourage nuclear development, Harder said, "frankly would have been better in legislation." He said he would like a "2.0" version of the Accelerating Deployment of Versatile, Advanced Nuclear for Clean Energy Act of 2024 to "incorporate some of the changes that the Trump administration has made at the [Nuclear Regulatory Commission]."

"But the way that I would characterize it is, move it from a zero-risk approach — where any new nuclear project presents more of a risk than the status quo — to a real risk-based approach," he said. "You can't have any regulatory agency that doesn't want to build anything at all ... And that's the way that unfortunately the NRC has been for decades."