New scorecard rates nation’s grid managers on connecting renewables

Across the country, electric demand is growing and could explode if green goals like electrifying home heating, industry and transportation come to fruition. At the same time, many states, utilities and businesses have pledged to decarbonize, helping push older coal and gas power plants that have struggled to stay economically competitive into retirement. Yet in the queues run by the organizations that manage the electric grid in much of the nation, more than 2 million megawatts of potential new power sources, chiefly solar, wind and batteries, are languishing, awaiting interconnection studies.