VELCO tells House committee Vermont must balance transmission upgrades and non‑transmission alternatives

Shanna Lisonbee, a spokesperson for the Vermont Electric Power Company (VELCO), briefed the House Energy and Digital Infrastructure Committee on Jan. 24 about VELCO’s role as the state’s transmission utility, the findings of its 2024 long‑range transmission plan and several projects and initiatives underway or under study.

VELCO is “the transmission utility in the state of Vermont,” Lisonbee told the committee, and is owned by the state’s 17 distribution utilities and the Vermont Low Income Trust for Electricity (VLITE). She said VELCO operates about 740 miles of transmission lines, roughly 1,600 miles of privately owned fiber optic network, about 55 substations and manages roughly 14,000 acres of rights‑of‑way. VELCO employs about 80 people and, Lisonbee said, was one of Vermont’s larger property taxpayers in 2024, paying about $31.8 million in property taxes.

The long‑range transmission plan and why it matters

VELCO publishes a Vermont long‑range transmission plan every three years, Lisonbee said, to identify reliability deficiencies over a 20‑year horizon and to start public discussion of possible fixes. The 2024 plan models two scenarios: a high‑load pathway aligned with state electrification goals and a lower‑adoption pathway. In VELCO’s high scenario the plan projects Vermont peak demand could reach about 1,600 megawatts by 2043.

Lisonbee said planners deliberately did not assume in the 2024 model that electric vehicle charging and other loads will be widely managed (so‑called flexible load management) because the available data are not yet robust enough to guarantee how much load can be shifted. “If we don't have the data to say that it can happen, we need to remove it from our planning assumption so that we can find a baseline,” she said. VELCO staff said that in an earlier plan (2021) they had assumed managed EV charging and that the 2021 plan showed no reliability deficiencies; the 2024 plan took a more conservative baseline.

The plan is tied to a Vermont System Planning Committee (VSPC), a stakeholder group created after the Northwest Reliability Project and a regulatory proceeding (docket 7081) to ensure “full, fair and timely consideration of cost‑effective non‑transmission alternatives,” Lisonbee said. The VSPC includes distribution utilities, regulators, supply and demand resource representatives and public members appointed by the Public Utility Commission (PUC). VELCO described the VSPC as the forum where load forecasts, planning assumptions and alternatives are reviewed with stakeholders.

Distributed energy resources, hosting capacity and siting

VELCO stressed that where distributed generation and storage are sited matters for transmission costs. Lisonbee said parts of northern Vermont are at or near transmission hosting capacity; other parts of the state are more open. She said VELCO is developing an interactive, public map that will allow developers to model injections (for example, a 100‑MW solar farm) and see where the transmission system can accept new resources and where upgrades would be required.

Grid‑enhancing technologies and a federal DOE grant

VELCO is deploying and studying grid‑enhancing technologies intended to get more value from existing lines before building new ones. Examples cited include dynamic line ratings (sensors that provide real‑time thermal limits for conductors) and a power‑flow control device called a “smart valve” sited in northwest Vermont in partnership with the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI). Lisonbee said the smart‑valve project received about $18 million from the U.S. Department of Energy and that the total project cost is roughly $47 million, with the remainder proposed to be socialized regionally if the project is approved.

Right‑sizing and near‑term local projects

VELCO described a Franklin County Line Upgrade project as a “rightsizing” effort on a 1957‑vintage corridor between Georgia and Highgate. The line includes roughly 212 poles that VELCO says must be replaced to meet reliability standards. Instead of a 1‑for‑1 replacement, VELCO plans to build new single‑steel monopoles on an adjacent alignment, keep service during construction, then decommission the original structures. Lisonbee said the rebuild would increase reliability and hosting capacity in that part of the grid and leave room for a possible second transmission circuit in the corridor.

Alliance transmission proposal with GridUnited

Lisonbee described a preliminary proposal, the Alliance Transmission Project, developed in partnership with GridUnited and Hydro‑Québec. In VELCO’s description the project would be a roughly 1,200‑MW bidirectional transmission link. She said Alliance is not part of one current New England RFP that focuses on a Maine–Boston corridor, but that bidders and system planners are again examining large regional transmission projects because several New England states have issued solicitations seeking renewable imports to meet state clean‑energy targets. VELCO said a project like Alliance could address the constrained Sheffield‑Highgate export interface in northwest Vermont and provide both local and regional benefits if structured to deliver Vermont upgrades along with regional capacity.

Data and communications work

VELCO stressed that its fiber network and a statewide radio system support operations and emergency communications. Lisonbee said VELCO’s privately owned fiber (about 1,600 miles) was built to provide two‑way telemetry from substations and is now being extended to provide visibility to distributed energy resources. VELCO also said it is developing a collaborative data‑sharing platform, the “Vermont Exchange,” intended to harmonize different utility data models and provide a common information view for transmission operators and distribution utilities.

Regulatory context and cost allocation

Lisonbee reviewed the regulatory framework: VELCO is subject to Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) rules and to reliability standards from the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) and regional coordination by the Northeast power council named in the briefing; ISO New England oversees regional planning and wholesale market rules. At the state level VELCO said it files projects with the Vermont Public Utility Commission and works with the Department of Public Service; VELCO noted the statute governing project siting and certificates of public good in Vermont (section 248) and the docket (7081) that created the present VSPC planning process.

What the committee asked and next steps

Committee members asked about technical terms (kilovolts, sub‑transmission), how storage might be used, why VELCO did not include managed EV charging in the 2024 planning baseline and whether VELCO experiences the same outage exposure as distribution utilities during storms. Lisonbee said transmission lines are built differently and that storm impacts are generally greater on distribution systems; she said VELCO’s radio and fiber teams do have maintenance and restoration work in storms.

Lisonbee said VELCO will provide a link to the long‑range transmission plan for committee materials and that the interactive hosting‑capacity map will be published when available. She emphasized that VELCO is pursuing a combination of options—non‑transmission alternatives, grid‑enhancing technologies, targeted upgrades and careful siting of DERs—to meet projected load growth and regional planning obligations.

Ending

VELCO’s briefing framed Vermont’s transmission needs as part of a regional system where costs and benefits are shared, while noting specific local constraints in northwest Vermont and near Highgate. VELCO urged continued stakeholder engagement through the Vermont System Planning Committee and public outreach as the long‑range plan and specific projects move forward.