Data from ComEd show that the cost of connecting 30 data centers to the power grid in Illinois will exceed $3 billion. Some of the spending has already been incurred, and the remaining investments are to be completed by 2031.
Data center developers have paid $721 million in advance payments toward the infrastructure needed to connect to the grid. Utility sector watchdog groups warn that the costs of any shortfall could ultimately fall on Illinois households and small businesses. ComEd disputes those concerns, stressing that it is actively working to protect customers from costs tied to data centers, including by securing $1.1 billion in credit that can be tapped if projects are not completed as planned.
Data centers are becoming the subject of increasingly intense debate in the United States. There are calls for regulations that would, among other things, require the operators of these facilities to pay for the energy and water resources they use. Consumer advocates warn, however, that beyond the cost of generating new power, the cost of the infrastructure needed to connect data centers to ComEd’s grid could be partly passed on to households and small businesses in northern Illinois.
Representatives of the utility dispute that claim. Documents ComEd submitted in a regulatory proceeding show that building new infrastructure and upgrading the system to connect 30 data centers to the grid will cost $3.1 billion. Some of these facilities have already been connected, and the rest are to come online by 2031. The developers of these data centers have paid advance payments totaling $721 million, which is just under 25% of the total cost.
Consumer organizations, including the Citizens Utility Board and the Environmental Law & Policy Center, say this could mean a shortfall of about $2 billion, an amount that could ultimately be spread across ordinary customers’ bills. “Ordinary households should not bear the cost of delivering power to data centers,” said Nick Wallace, an attorney at the environmental law organization. “ComEd and the Illinois Commerce Commission can protect energy customers and the grid itself by requiring data centers to cover 100% of the costs of their energy supply and infrastructure investments,” he added.
ComEd maintains that the consumer groups’ analysis leaves out the $1.1 billion secured through lines of credit, which guarantee that data centers make payments for power over a 10-year period. The $3.1 billion figure comes from two components of the electricity transmission and distribution system. Both involve using poles and wires to carry electricity from one place to another, but they refer to different stages of that process. Transmission lines carry high-voltage electricity over long distances, along highways and across state lines, from power plants to local substations, where the voltage is reduced. Distribution lines then deliver that power to the homes and businesses that use it.
The costs of connecting the data centers are split roughly evenly: $1.6 billion is for transmission and $1.5 billion is for distribution. For several individual projects, transmission costs exceed $100 million, with one expected to cost as much as $289 million and another $269 million.
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Source: Polski.FM
