Requests the adoption of enhanced regional transmission planning processes that use a multi-scenario, multi-value framework to ensure long-term national security, grid reliability, and resilience.
SCR 22 is a concurrent resolution urging regional transmission organizations and grid planners to adopt enhanced long-term transmission planning processes. It calls for a multi-scenario, multi-value framework that evaluates projects not only for cost and reliability, but also for national security, resilience, economic development, and alignment with state and federal energy goals. The resolution emphasizes planning horizons of at least 20 years and the use of best-available data to account for future electricity demand, technological change, and major disruptions.
The resolution specifically highlights Louisiana’s dependence on a secure and affordable electric grid and frames transmission planning as important to public safety, economic growth, and the state’s role as an energy producer. It also urges planners to account for extreme weather and climate-related risks, including hurricanes, floods, and winter storms, and to consider equitable cost allocation so Louisiana ratepayers and businesses are not unfairly burdened by regional projects. Copies of the resolution are directed to the Louisiana Public Service Commission, the Department of Energy and Natural Resources, MISO, and the Southwest Power Pool.
SCR 22 does not amend Louisiana statutes or create enforceable legal requirements; instead, it expresses the Legislature’s position and urges action by regional transmission planners and organizations. Its practical effect is to place legislative support behind long-range transmission planning, resilience planning, and fair cost allocation principles, while signaling Louisiana’s policy priorities to the Public Service Commission, state energy officials, and regional grid operators such as MISO and SPP.
The overall sentiment is strongly supportive and forward-looking. The resolution presents transmission modernization as necessary for grid reliability, national security, economic competitiveness, and protection against severe weather. Because there is no recorded committee debate or vote history in the provided materials, there is no evidence of formal opposition in the record supplied; the tone of the measure itself is affirmative and advocacy-oriented.
The main points of contention implied by the resolution are not about whether the grid should be reliable, but about how regional transmission costs and benefits should be allocated and how much weight should be given to long-term, multi-value planning versus narrower cost-based approaches. The resolution specifically stresses that Louisiana consumers and businesses should not pay disproportionate costs for projects whose benefits may be regional, and it urges more investment in the southern United States relative to the northern United States. These concerns suggest potential tension among ratepayer advocates, utilities, regional grid planners, and states competing over transmission investment priorities.