Rising demand for power to fuel the AI data center boom and electrification has strained utilities, grid operators, and regulators across the U.S.
OATI’s application for the Department of Energy’s SPARK grant, PowerNow, aims to unlock 10-20% transmission capacity without any new infrastructure.
The U.S. transmission grid has more physical capacity than the commercial systems currently make available. The tools that determine how much of that capacity can be used — the systems that calculate Available Transfer Capability for over 95% of all bulk power transactions in the country — rely on conservative assumptions, static line ratings, and manual coordination processes that are more than 20 years old.
The result is a grid that routinely understates its own capability. Curtailments persist on lines with physical headroom. New loads from data centers, electrification, and industrial expansion wait in interconnection queues while existing infrastructure goes underutilized. And billions of dollars in transmission assets deliver less value than they could. This is not a construction problem. It is an operational software and coordination problem, and it’s solvable now.
DOE SPARK: A federal push to unlock existing grid capacity
The U.S. Department of Energy recognizes this challenge. DOE launched SPARK (Speed to Power through Accelerated Reconductoring and other Key Advanced Transmission Technology Upgrades) a competitive grant program under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act designed to accelerate the deployment of advanced transmission technologies across the U.S. grid. SPARK funds projects that can deliver quantifiable increases in transfer capability, reduce congestion, and lower electricity costs with an emphasis on solutions that can be implemented quickly using existing infrastructure rather than requiring years of new construction.
After initially submitting a concept paper for SPARK funding under Topic Area 2 (Smart Grid), OATI has submitted a formal application under an initiative we call PowerNow.
What is the ‘PowerNow’ initiative?
PowerNow is an OATI-led initiative to deploy advanced transmission technologies across the systems that already manage the vast majority of U.S. bulk power transactions. The goal: a 10–20% increase in available transmission capacity and a 5%+ reduction in curtailments. All without building a single new transmission line.
PowerNow builds on OATI’s 30-year track record as the operational backbone of North American transmission commerce. Our OASIS, transmission scheduling, e-Tagging, and congestion management platforms are already in production at over 95% of U.S. transmission owners and transmission service providers. PowerNow deploys the next generation of capabilities directly into these systems, meaning capacity gains begin flowing to the grid as each enhancement goes live, not after a multi-year construction cycle.
POLITICO/E&E NEWS
“Bloomington, Minnesota, based utility software company OATI applied for a slice
of that DOE funding, which the firm said is crucial for providing federal direction
to the web of grid infrastructure owners and operators.
Chief Operations Officer Kevin Sarkinen said his firm’s digital products
would more efficiently bring the increasingly diverse array of energy
sources onto the grid in real-time and maximize their response to
weather conditions to increase electricity capacity.
One platform, three focus areas
Automated Inter-Regional Coordination
Today, neighboring transmission operators exchange constraint data on weekly, daily, or hourly cycles. Between updates, operators default to conservative assumptions that artificially restrict available capacity. PowerNow replaces these manual exchanges with automated, near-real-time coordination. When one operator’s constraints change, its neighbors receive immediate updates and dynamically adjust their own capacity calculations. The capacity gains are largest when clusters of adjacent operators adopt this capability simultaneously, which is exactly why this requires coordinated deployment rather than piecemeal adoption.
Software-Based Dynamic Line Ratings.
Most transmission lines today are rated using static assumptions based on worst-case weather conditions, even when actual conditions allow significantly more power to flow safely. PowerNow computes real-time and forecast line ratings using weather data, conductor characteristics, geospatial information, and AI-enhanced thermal modeling, adhering to IEEE 738 and IEEE 1283 standards. This unlocks capacity that already exists on the physical grid without requiring sensor hardware on every monitored line.
AI-Enhanced Redispatch and Congestion Management
When transmission paths are constrained, flexible resources — demand response, storage, controllable loads — can relieve congestion faster and more precisely than traditional solutions. PowerNow integrates these resources into the operational dispatch process using OATI’s AI Genie™ platform, identifying the highest-impact actions for each constraint in real time.
The PowerNow coalition
PowerNow is not a single-company effort. The initiative brings together a coalition of RTOs, investor-owned utilities, public power systems, cooperatives, and research organizations spanning all three U.S. Interconnections.
This team represents the diversity of the U.S. grid — from large RTOs to rural cooperatives, from the Pacific Northwest to the Southeast. Their participation ensures that PowerNow’s enhancements are designed and validated for the full range of operational environments, not just one region or one type of utility.
What ‘PowerNow’ could do for the grid
PowerNow targets four measurable outcomes:
- 10–20% increase in available transmission capacity, measured through existing OASIS systems across participating operators.
- 5%+ reduction in transmission curtailments, directly lowering costs and improving reliability.
- Consumer cost reduction from lower congestion charges and more efficient use of existing generation and transmission assets.
- No new construction costs or environmental impacts — capacity gains come entirely from smarter use of infrastructure that already exists.
The grid is under more pressure than it has been in decades. Data centers, electrification, and industrial growth are driving the most significant load increases in a generation. PowerNow is OATI’s commitment to meeting that challenge by getting more from the grid we already have — faster, cheaper, and at a scale that no single construction project can match.
How to get involved
While our formal application has been submitted to the DOE, there are still opportunities for utilities, transmission owners, and grid operators to get involved in the PowerNow initiative.
Let us know if you would like to get involved by submitting the following contact form.
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