Process "Prospecting" to Improve Renewable Energy Interconnection Queues: A Case Study

Globally, interconnecting a new solar or wind generation project to the grid involves navigating a queue requiring financial deposits, engineering studies, and fees to upgrade the electric grid. The process can take years, during which time changes to regulatory regimes, tax incentives, financial markets, or competitive pressures can make a project suddenly nonviable for an investor. For grid operators, the increasing saturation of intermittent generation concurrent with retiring fossil fuel generation makes every new project increasingly complex to assess. This paper provides a case study of applying process mining techniques to address the question of whether the options proposed by Duke Energy Carolinas (DEC) to reform its generation interconnection queue process are warranted. Two options for reform have been proposed: creating study clusters based on concurrency or creating them based on locational proximity. Results indicate support for aspects of both options, although some causes may prove uncontrollable due to their origin in external factors such as market competition and power systems engineering decision making.