PJM Interconnection, the organization that manages the transmission grid delivering electricity to about 65 million people from the mid-Atlantic coast to the Great Lakes, badly needs more power. In fact, its inability to connect projects languishing in its interconnection queues — most of them solar, wind, and batteries ready to replace closing coal-fired power plants — has spiked the cost of power, is threatening state clean power goals, and may put grid reliability at risk before decade’s end.

Last week, PJM won approval from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission for two dramatically different approaches to solving these problems. But clean energy companies and advocates say one of the plans is unfair and won’t work — and they’re hoping the grid operator will focus on the cleaner, faster, and more realistic alternatives at hand.

The plan critics take issue with, known as the Reliability Resource Initiative, allows PJM to fast-track some ​“dispatchable” generation resources — most likely, fossil gas–fired power plants — ahead of all the other projects that have been waiting for years to get connected, the vast majority of which are wind, solar, and batteries.

Power plant owners, utilities, and state regulators support the RRI. But opponents say it runs counter to fair and open grid access and market competition rules, could complicate already-clogged interconnection processes, and will likely fail to deliver the fast grid relief PJM is looking for.

At a FERC meeting last week, the RRI proposal passed by a 3-1 vote, with the fifth commissioner, Lindsay See, a Republican, abstaining. But only Mark Christie, a Republican who was named FERC chair by the Trump administration last month, voted in support of the plan without expressing reservations.

Willie Phillips and David Rosner, the two Democrats who voted in favor of RRI, said in a concurrence to the decision that their approval was a ​“one-time emergency measure” and that the plan is ​“not a substitute for a well-functioning interconnection process.” Judy Chang, a Democrat who voted against the plan, wrote in her dissenting statement that RRI ​“presents a risk of the worst of both worlds: It compromises the Commission’s open access principles with no guarantee it will resolve PJM’s reliability issue.”

One problem with RRI, Chang wrote, is that it seeks to fast-track the kind of power plants that are the hardest to build quickly: ​”large generators, which are the most challenging to develop, acquire the necessary environmental permits, and obtain adequate material supplies and labor for construction.”

Another problem is that PJM’s methodology for choosing which projects get fast-tracked primarily rewards large ones, rather than prioritizing criteria like whether they can be brought online before 2030 or built at sites with existing ​“headroom” on PJM’s grid, even though those are ​“arguably the two most critical factors to meeting its identified reliability needs,” Chang wrote.

Critics have expressed similar concerns since PJM launched the RRI plan in October. The grid operator predicted that the plan could spur 10 gigawatts of new power plants by 2028. But industry observers say it’s highly unlikely that many gas-fired power plants could be built or connected that quickly.

Just getting the new gas turbines needed for these power plants can take four to five years given current order backlogs, according to industry experts. Last month, renewable energy developer NextEra Energy announced plans to build gas power plants with GE Vernova. But CEO John Ketchum noted in an earnings call that gas-fired generation projects not already well along in the procurement and construction process ​“won’t be available at scale until 2030 and then only in certain pockets of the U.S.”

Nor are large power plants likely to fit easily onto a PJM grid that’s already too congested to connect most projects, at least not without significant and costly grid upgrades, said Caitlin Marquis, managing director at clean energy trade group Advanced Energy United.

Letting up to 50 projects leap to the front of the line ​“could raise interconnection upgrade costs” for the many other projects that have been waiting to get onto the grid, she said.

Even the Electric Power Supply Association, a trade group representing companies that own and develop gas-fired power plants, has voiced reservations about the RRI plan. ​“All resources play a role in the evolving energy landscape; this limited tool is only necessary to address short-term interconnection queue bottlenecks and the current supply crunch,” Todd Snitchler, the group’s president and CEO, said in a statement last week. ​“We anticipate that PJM’s queue reform process will resolve these challenges, making such measures unnecessary in the future.”

Faster — and cleaner — ways to boost the grid

All of these drawbacks make the RRI plan a nonstarter, critics say. But there are many other options that PJM could pursue, according to Marquis.

“Those solutions that don’t upend market expectations are the pathway you should take, rather than turning to a solution that’s going to have a lot of disruption and market risk and still yield uncertain outcomes,” she said.

The second PJM plan approved by FERC last week, known as Surplus Interconnection Service, is one such option. In simple terms, it lays out rules for existing projects to add new resources — like batteries to wind and solar farms — to provide more power when the grid needs it most.

That proposal won broad support from groups that have fought over RRI, including clean energy advocates and fossil fuel power plant owners who are usually at odds. The new plan, clean energy advocates point out, is much improved from PJM’s previous SIS regime.