Missouri agency OKs wind-energy line

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — Missouri regulators reversed course Wednesday and gave the go-ahead to one of the nation’s largest renewable-energy projects — a high-voltage power line delivering wind energy from the Midwest to a power grid for Eastern states.

The proposed Grain Belt Express transmission line would stretch 780 miles from Kansas across Missouri and Illinois before hooking into an electric grid in Indiana that serves the Eastern U.S. The $2.3 billion project had twice been rejected by the Missouri Public Service Commission, but it reconsidered after a ruling last year by the state Supreme Court.

Missouri’s approval is a big step but not the final one before construction can begin.

In November, Chicago-based Invenergy announced it was buying the project from Houston-based Clean Line Energy Partners. That deal should bolster the financing, but Invenergy said the sale still needs regulatory approval in Missouri and Kansas. The transmission line also needs to regain regulatory approval in Illinois, where a state appeals court last year overturned the state’s previous approval.

The Grain Belt Express project has highlighted one of the biggest challenges facing renewable-energy developers in the U.S. Converting wind into electricity is increasingly cheaper, but it can sometimes be difficult to get the various governmental approvals necessary to string the power lines from the remote areas where the energy is produced to the more populated places where it’s consumed.