Hecate Energy lacks standing to challenge the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's approval of a PJM Interconnection LLC proposal to fast-track interconnection requests that require upgrade costs of $5 million or less, the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled.
The Jan. 21 opinion reasoned that the solar company failed to prove that its project would be expedited if the provision was vacated.
PJM proposed a series of reforms, including the $5 million expedition cap, to FERC in 2022 to more efficiently manage its interconnection backlog and reduce wait times.
Hecate, while generally supportive of the changes, said PJM failed to provide an evidence-based justification for the $5 million cap. The solar company has at least one project in PJM's interconnection queue with assigned network upgrade costs in excess of $5 million, and it said the exclusion will lead to significant, costly delays.
FERC approved the proposal and denied Hecate's rehearing request, finding that PJM had reasonably justified the cap by demonstrating that projects with assigned costs under $5 million have historically been easier to process than more expensive projects.
Hecate petitioned the court for review, saying that the commission acted arbitrarily and capriciously by not considering alternative eligibility rules.
The court said it did not rule on the merits of the case because Hecate failed to prove that a court ruling would alleviate the injury it claimed.
"Hecate does not show that [vacating FERC's order] would make it likely — let alone 'substantially likely' — that its requested relief would spur PJM to take the additional steps necessary to include Hecate's project in its expedited process," Judge Cornelia Pillard wrote in the court's majority opinion.
The court said Hecate's injury would only be redressed if PJM resubmitted its expedited process eligibility rules to include some projects whose costs exceeded the cap.
"Given PJM's aims, incentives, and independent decision-making authority, that outcome is particularly unlikely," Pillard said. "PJM would have a wide array of options for curing the alleged defect with the $5 million cap that do not involve — and are more conducive to its goals than — expediting projects assessed over $5 million in network upgrade costs."
Neither the court nor FERC has the authority to require PJM to change its rules to accommodate Hecate's proposal, Pillard added.
Judges Karen LeCraft Henderson and Julianna Michelle Childs joined the court's opinion. The case is Hecate Energy v. FERC (23-1089).
