Midwest ISO transmission planning processes

The Midwest ISO is the RTO for 15 states in the central U.S. Multiple, interlinked planning processes are in progress annually within the Midwest ISO. The Transmission Expansion Plan is a 10 year plan that recommends the projects approved for construction. The Generation Interconnection and Transmission Service planning is an input to the Transmission Expansion Plan. Mid range Targeted Studies are conducted each year to resolve important issues and to provide information about conceptual studies that link the Expansion Plan to the Long Range Economic studies. Mid range studies provide grouping of interests to provide a sequence of proposed project construction to the continuous process of planning. Often mid range studies involve only one area of the Midwest ISO. Long range studies using economic methods to determine conceptual transmission expansion designs provide economic and system performance information for management, stakeholders, regulators, legislators and other policy makers. The long range studies provide a road map for the development of the transmission expansion based on inputs from multiple Futures that the transmission system may have to operate in the future. A Future is a set of assumptions that relate to a question that is of importance to stakeholders of the power system. A Future may be a 20% wind energy policy, a carbon policy, a nuclear policy or other issue.