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How to Save America’s Transmission System - Institute for Progress

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The American power grid is sometimes called “the world’s largest machine,” with its more than 500,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines, 5 million miles of distribution lines, and thousands of power plants.1 Decarbonization will make it even larger. If we aim to transform the power grid to renewables, the resulting infrastructure project will be as big as anything America has ever built. For scale, in 2023 dollars, the Interstate Highway system cost roughly $250 billion,2 and the Apollo Program cost approximately $300 billion.3 According to the NREL, decarbonizing the US electrical grid will cost between $330 and $740 billion.4 The reason it costs this much is that, of the 73.5 quadrillion BTUs of energy consumed by Americans in 2021, less than 20% was provided via electric power.5 By one estimate, decarbonization will require quadrupling electricity generation.6 An NREL model7 similarly estimates that reducing emissions by 80% from 2005 levels will require nearly tripling elect

Download PDF Content The limits of scale Increased variability Decreasing reliability Barriers to building infrastructure Hard and soft paths revisited The American power grid is sometimes called “the world’s largest machine,” with its more than 500,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines, 5 million miles of distribution lines, and thousands of power plants. 1 Decarbonization will make it even larger. If we aim to transform the power grid to renewables, the resulting infrastructure project will be as big as anything America has ever built. For scale, in 2023 dollars, the Interstate

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