The U.S. Department of Energy announced Wednesday it won't move forward with three National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors selected for review by the Biden administration in 2024, saying the corridors were chosen as a "means to advance" the previous administration's "Green New Scam agenda." The cancelled projects are the Lake Erie–Canada Corridor, the Southwestern Grid Connector Corridor, and the Tribal Energy Access Corridor. Energy Secretary Chris Wright stated that transmission policy must serve Americans, "not special interests or a climate-alarmist agenda that drives up costs, worsens reliability, and disregards the concerns of local communities."
The three abandoned corridors were intended to fulfill several purposes, according to a cached DOE webpage from March 2026. The projects would have delivered resource adequacy support to the PJM Interconnection and established "cross-interconnection and interregional connections" linking the Southwest Power Pool and WestConnect regions. The Tribal Energy Access Corridor, which was proposed to run largely through South Dakota, aimed to advance Tribal energy and economic development "by addressing a lack of extra high-voltage transmission." A NIETC designation can unlock federal financing tools, specifically public-private partnerships, and allows the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to issue permits for siting transmission lines within the corridor when state authorities either lack authority, haven't acted on an application for over a year, or have rejected one.
The DOE's release claimed that the "current designation framework proved ineffective in strengthening grid reliability and reducing electricity costs." The agency also alleged that in some communities, the framework "contributed to confusion and concern about the scope and intent of NIETC authority." According to the agency, a NIETC is an area where DOE has "determined the lack of adequate transmission harms consumers and that the development of new transmission would advance important national interests in that area, such as increased reliability and reduced consumer costs." Cattle producer trade association R-CALF USA praised the decision, having raised concerns in 2024 about the corridors potentially disrupting independent livestock operations or causing the loss of essential grazing and haying lands.
Environmental groups sharply criticized the cancellation, arguing DOE is rejecting an opportunity to strengthen the grid. The Clean Air Task Force said the scrapped corridors were selected to "help address areas with significant transmission congestion," which increases costs and reduces reliability for ratepayers. Nicole Pavia, the organization's Director of Clean Energy Infrastructure Deployment, stated that if the goal is affordable, reliable, and secure electricity, "we should be making it easier to build the infrastructure the grid needs — not dismantling federal frameworks designed to facilitate it." The Environmental Defense Fund noted that while Wright called the current designation framework ineffective, DOE's own National Transmission Needs Study from July said that NIETC designation "enables DOE and FERC to use valuable federal financing and permitting tools to spur construction or modification of transmission facilities within a NIETC." The DOE said the Trump administration has taken other steps to build and modernize transmission infrastructure, pointing to several billion-dollar loans from its Office of Energy Dominance Financing for transmission line projects.