NMSU, New Mexico are national leaders in grid modernization

“New Mexico in so many areas is leading the way,” U.S. Rep. Melanie Stansbury, D-N.M., said about the state’s electric grid modernization.

New Mexico State University is doing “very, very cutting-edge research” on the grid, said Olga Lavrova, an associate professor at NMSU’s Klipsch School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, director of the NMSU Electric Utility Management Program and holder of the Willam H. Kersting Endowed Chair in Power Systems Engineering.

“We’re helping our state become what it needs to become,” said NMSU Arrowhead Research Park Executive Director Wayne Savage. NMSU projects include Aggie Power, a partnership with El Paso Electric to address mutual renewable energy goals, climate change and grid development, Savage said.

What is the grid?

“For the most part, our grid was built 50-100 years ago,” said Stansbury, who sponsored the Energy Grid Modernization Roadmap when she was an Albuquerque state representative in 2020. The bill passed the New Mexico Legislature with only one no vote and was signed into law by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, directing the state “to develop a strategic plan for energy grid modernization.” 

New Mexico’s grid is tied into two of the nation’s three major electricity grids: the Western Interconnection and the Texas Interconnected system. It also connects to the grid in Mexico, the electric grid system for North America and the worldwide grid.

Large utility companies El Paso Electric (EPE) and Public Service Company of New Mexico (PNM) are major grid components, along with smaller privately owned utilities such as the SunZia Southwest Transmission Project that has transmission lines crossing more than 500 miles of federal, state and private land in New Mexico and Arizona and the Afton “Southline” project, a new high-voltage transmission line that will run from Afton, New Mexico (southwest of Las Cruces) west along Interstate 10 to export power to Arizona and points west, to be fully online by 2028; electric cooperatives across

the state, including 15 members of the New Mexico Rural Electric Cooperative; New Mexico communities; and Indian nations, tribes and pueblos.

Renewable energy sources like wind and solar, along with nuclear energy (non-renewable and non-carbon) are also part of the grid, and fossil fuels like oil, natural gas and coal (PNM owns part of the coal-fired Four Corners Generating Station in San Juan County). The grid also includes the transmission lines, towers and generator stations that deliver electricity to consumers.

“We are interconnected,” Savage said. And the upgrade? “It’s a challenge,” he said.

The U.S. Department of Energy and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission have principal federal oversight of the grid, and the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission is the chief in-state watchdog, along with the legislature.

The state legislature is also a potential funding source for the grid, along with Uncle Sam. Stansbury’s legislation for a New Mexico rid roadmap includes a grid modernization grant program for eligible projects proposed by local governments, state agencies, universities, public schools and Native American governmental entities.

And now as a member of New Mexico’s federal delegation, Stansbury said $17.5 million coming to New Mexico through the federal infrastructure bill will pay for grid modernization and solar installation in the state.

Grid research and development players, along with NMSU and other New Mexico universities, include Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories and renewable energy advocates. Other participants include the environmental community and private industry, including oil and gas companies.

It takes “a high level of technical know-how to modernize and transition (the grid) to clean energy,” Stansbury said.

Because there are so many involved, the state grid doesn’t belong to any one entity.

“Nobody owns the grid,” Lavrova said. “It’s for everyone’s benefit.”

NMSU’s grid work

“We’re moving very quickly toward electric vehicles and appliances,” Savage said. “Nobody’s talking about how the grid is going to handle that load.”

But New Mexico State is working on the issue, including solar power development and grid safety and stability research, NMSU said in a September 2022 news release. Aggie Power is an EPE-owned three-megawatt storage facility covering 29 acres between Interstate 10 and Interstate 25 to provide “clean renewable power” to NMSU’s Las Cruces campus. 

The one-megawatt battery pack is the first battery-storage network on the EPE grid, Savage said.

Solar energy charges the battery, which stores the energy “until the grid calls for it,” Savage said.

There is “a great deal of interest” in NMSU’s testing of different battery technologies,” Savage said, to help meet the growing demand for electricity.

Aggie Power also provides research and training for electrical engineering students, with Lavrova overseeing both educational and research efforts, NMSU said.

“Grid research unique to NMSU” is theoretical, but it’s also “real, in-the-ground research,” said Lavrova, who came to NMSU from Sandia National Laboratory five years “to do this research,” she said.

 NMSU owns and operates two of its own electrical substations, Lavrova said, which is “super different” for a university.