⚖ Oral Arguments, with Context

The Fifth Circuit hears Arkansas Public Service Commission versus FERC, a dispute over who should pay for major electric-grid upgrades. Power-plant developers were struggling to connect new generation near the boundary between two regional grid operators, MISO and Southwest Power Pool. Limited transmission capacity, expensive upgrades and repeated studies were holding projects back. The operators proposed the Joint Targeted Interconnection Queue, or JTIQ, with five transmission projects intended to help more power plants connect. The plan deducts federal grant funding and assigns the remaining capital costs to subscribing generators. Electricity customers cover shortfalls if too few generators sign up, and later generator payments can reimburse those customers. FERC, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, approved this approach and upheld it on rehearing. Arkansas and Mississippi regulators challenge charging customers in MISO's southern region for projects in the north, saying those customers receive no meaningful benefits. Clean-energy associations bring a separate challenge: they say electricity customers benefit too, so generators should not carry the capital costs alone. FERC and the grid operators say new generators drive these projects and receive their main benefits, while other customers benefit enough to justify the backup obligation. The court must decide whether this allocation meets the Federal Power Act's requirement for just and reasonable rates. Another issue is whether the state regulators preserved their objections to the evidence. Federal law normally requires objections to be raised with FERC on rehearing before a court can consider them. William Booth will speak first for the state regulators. He will contend that FERC has not demonstrated benefits to southern customers sufficient to justify these charges.

Arkansas Public Service Commission v. FERC (No. 25-60127) — U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, argued October 7, 2026.