This bill pushes the federal energy regulator to help move electricity more easily between neighboring regions. The goal is to keep the lights on during extreme weather, physical threats, or cyberattacks by setting a baseline level of power-sharing between regions and making sure grid planners use the same method to measure and plan for that transfer. It also limits the sharing of sensitive cyberattack details to protect the grid’s security.

Grid planners in each pair of neighboring regions must file a plan that picks the needed interregional transmission projects and meets the minimum transfer level, with updates at least every five years. The regulator must approve or deny these plans and publish reports on how this is working after the rules are in place. When judging projects, planners should consider broad benefits like reliability, safety, security, costs, and environmental impacts, including situations when real-time prices and conditions differ from day-ahead expectations.

• Who is affected: Grid operators and transmission planners; households and businesses that depend on reliable power.
• What changes: National rules for measuring and increasing power-sharing across regional grids; protection of sensitive cyber information; regular planning and reporting.
• When: Rules within 24 months of enactment; first regional plans within 3 years and at least every 5 years after; annual reports starting 48 months after the rules are issued.