The Department of Energy has canceled three major transmission line projects initiated during the Biden administration, siding with critics who argued the proposed routes threatened private property rights and local control.
The move marks another setback for long-distance power lines that could help carry more renewable electricity across the country, as Straight Arrow News reported.
Here's what to know
The DOE canceled the Tribal Energy Access Corridor, the Southwestern Grid Connector Corridor, and the Lake Erie-Canada Corridor.
Two of the proposed projects were in the West, while the third would have run from Pennsylvania, beneath Lake Erie, and connected to Canada.
These lines are meant to carry electricity from faraway power plants and renewable sources to cities, towns, and industrial areas. But getting them built is especially difficult because their routes can cross multiple states, local jurisdictions, and privately owned land.
Those siting fights helped doom the projects.
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Rural landowners and some Republican officials praised the cancellations, while clean energy advocates and grid experts warned that the decision could slow efforts to build a more reliable power system.
In a press release, Energy Secretary Chris Wright defended the decision.
"Transmission policy must serve the American people — not special interests or a climate-alarmist agenda," he said.
Wright also claimed that the projects would raise costs and weaken reliability. Wright, though, has previously spoken on the record with a misrepresentation that renewable energy is less reliable, neglecting to factor — as Elon Musk pointed out — the existence of battery storage technology to absorb and distribute that power in a consistent way, especially when given the same investment as energy options such as nuclear power.
More background
The dispute is especially notable because even federal research has pointed to major benefits from expanding transmission infrastructure.
A 2024 study from the Biden-era DOE and the National Laboratory of the Rockies found that stronger interregional connections would improve reliability and produce $1.60 to $1.80 in savings for each dollar spent on new transmission lines.
Even the current DOE has acknowledged the potential upside.
"Interregional and cross-interconnection transmission links show the highest potential value to relieve transmission congestion," the department said in a July draft of an updated study.
A major source of friction is eminent domain.
For transmission projects, the government may grant developers authority to acquire land even when property owners do not want to sell, and that dynamic has created tension between the energy industry and ranchers in Texas.
The dispute pits private land and local input against efforts to build lower-cost, more dependable power infrastructure.
What's being done?
The cancellations do not mean the federal government has abandoned transmission entirely.
The Trump administration has offered roughly $30 billion in loans to power companies such as American Electric Power and Southern Company to help complete transmission projects.
Some analysts say the larger problem is a system that changes course whenever political power shifts in Washington.
Rob Gramlich, founder and president of Grid Strategies LLC, told NOTUS: "There's no reason to have DOE in the middle of the process making designations that get reversed with each new administration."
Local opposition also continues to shape what gets built.
The South Dakota Farm Bureau opposed a transmission project in its state, and private landowner concerns were already a major reason the DOE canceled Biden-era funding for a separate Midwest line.
Rep. Lauren Boebert, a Republican representing rural Colorado, praised the decision.
"This is a smart course correction. I will continue fighting to protect consumers, private property rights, and local input," she stated.
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