Dive Brief:
- If approved by the Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC), the American Transmission Company (ATC) will form a separate holding company for projects outside its home state of Wisconsin. The change was required because of the company’s increasing project development across the country.
- Consumer groups were concerned Wisconsin customers could be harmed if the transmission-only utility incurs financial difficulties in other states. They consented to the reorganization plan adopted by the Wisconsin Public Service Commission to protect its ability to oversee ATC.
- ATC's utility backers first raised questions over its finances in 2013 when ATC and partner Duke Energy invested $56 million in a California interstate transmission line and assumed $137 million in debt.
Dive Insight:
ATC owns and operates the electric transmission systems in parts of Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Illinois. The ICC is expected to rule on the reorganization before the end of 2016.
ATC’s $580 Badger Coulee line to connect Madison and La Crosse in Wisconsin will begin construction by the end of 2016. Another Wisconsin project, in partnership with ITC, would connect Madison and Dubuque. It was planned to begin construction by 2020 but has been delayed by federal reviews required because it will cross the Mississippi River.
The Duke American Transmission Company (DUKE-ATC) owns 72% of the 84 mile, 500 kV, 1,500 MW Path 15 project that connects the Northern and Southern California transmission grids. Duke-ATC is working on premitting for the proposed 62 mile, 500 kV San Luis project that would deliver power to California’s underserved Central Valley.
Duke-ATC's most ambitious undertaking is the proposed 3,000 MW, 500-plus mile, 500 kV high voltage Zephyr Power Transmission Project that would deliver Wyoming wind to markets in California and the Southwest.
