New Grid Tech Bill Offers Developers 25% Cut of Savings, Mandates Public Map of Power Congestion Costs

The Advancing GETs Act of 2025 is trying to fix one of the biggest bottlenecks in our infrastructure: the electrical grid. Essentially, this bill creates a new financial incentive for utilities and developers to stop relying solely on expensive, time-consuming new transmission lines and start using smart, modern technology to squeeze more efficiency out of the lines we already have. It does this by defining “Grid-Enhancing Technology” (GETs)—which is hardware or software that boosts capacity, efficiency, or reliability on existing systems—and then setting up a reward system for anyone who installs it.

The Smart Grid Incentive: Sharing the Savings

This is the core of the bill. It directs the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to establish a “shared savings” incentive program within 18 months. If a developer installs an eligible GET, they get to keep a percentage of the money saved by that technology over a three-year period. The percentage is set between 10% and 25% of the total savings, and here’s the kicker: it must be a consistent rate across all projects, meaning FERC can’t play favorites. For a utility or developer, this is a clear financial signal to upgrade. However, there’s a serious hurdle: the expected savings generated by the GET must be at least four times the cost of the investment over that three-year period. If you’re a developer, you need to prove a massive return on investment to qualify for this incentive, which is great for consumers because it means we’re only incentivizing technology that delivers big results, but it might sideline smaller, incremental improvements.

Mapping the Money Pit: Congestion Transparency

Ever wonder why the power company sometimes has to tell a wind farm to stop generating electricity, even when the wind is blowing? It’s usually because of congestion—bottlenecks in the transmission system that prevent power from getting where it needs to go. This bill mandates major transparency here. Any operator running transmission lines must file an annual report with FERC detailing all their congestion management costs that exceed $500,000. They have to explain what caused the bottleneck and what the official limit is. FERC and the Department of Energy will then take all this data and create a publicly available map showing where these congestion costs are happening across the entire transmission system, updated yearly. For the average person, this is huge: it pulls back the curtain on where the grid is failing and where future investment is most desperately needed, making regulators and utilities accountable for those specific weak spots.

Lowering the Barrier to Entry for New Tech

If you’re a utility manager, trying a new piece of grid software can feel like a massive risk. To reduce that risk, the bill requires the Secretary of Energy to create and annually update a detailed application guide for using GETs within 18 months. More importantly, the Secretary must set up a “clearinghouse” to collect information on successful GET projects. Think of it as a central database of case studies and best practices. If a smaller utility in the Midwest is trying to figure out how to use dynamic line rating technology, they can look up what a utility in the Northeast did. This provision is designed to make sure that the financial incentives in Section 3 actually translate into widespread adoption, instead of just benefiting the few big players who can afford the initial R&D risk.