Tech
Crane Has Power. PJM Won't Carry It Until 2030.
Constellation's $1.6 billion restart of Three Mile Island Unit 1 sells 835 MW to Microsoft, but only 760 MW carries grid delivery rights until new transmission lines finish in December 2030. The FERC ruling that bridges the gap has slipped from June toward July.
Constellation filed at FERC in March to keep Three Mile Island Unit 1, now Crane Clean Energy Center, on its 2027 restart date.
The $1.6 billion restart, backed by a $1 billion DOE loan, is anchored by a 20-year Microsoft power purchase agreement covering all 835 MW of the plant's output.
The waiver asks FERC to transfer 760 MW of Capacity Interconnection Rights from Eddystone units 3 and 4, a dual-fuel plant near Philadelphia kept alive by DOE emergency orders. Crane's nameplate is 835 MW.
Between the 2027 restart and December 2030, the grid can carry only 760 of those megawatts. The 75 MW above the CIR transfer has no delivery rights, placing roughly 9% of Microsoft's contracted volume at curtailment risk during transmission-constrained periods.
The Bridge
The restart has no conventional path to PJM's June 30 base capacity auction without the waiver. The CIRs come from Eddystone units 3 and 4, scheduled to retire May 31, 2025 before DOE emergency orders intervened.
DOE issued at least four Section 202(c) emergency orders since May 2025, keeping Eddystone online to prevent winter shortfalls across PJM. The most recent ran through May 24, 2026.
Under each order, Eddystone operates outside normal PJM capacity classification, freeing its 760 MW of CIRs for transfer. Whether those rights survive a retirement date without a successor order is a question the FERC docket has not yet answered.
The Opposition
PJM's market monitor, Monitoring Analytics, filed against the waiver on April 21. It argues Constellation "fails to meet any of FERC's criteria" and is seeking relief from "the consequences of its own business decisions." The transfer, it warns, could shift upgrade costs onto other interconnection customers.
The market monitor's April filing exposes the central leap in Constellation's logic. Emergency orders kept Eddystone alive for grid reliability. Constellation is asking FERC to treat the capacity rights those orders created as a transferable bridge to a commercial data center deal.
Executives guided investors on May 13 to expect the ruling in "June or July." If it lands in July, Crane misses the June 30 auction. The next PJM base capacity auction runs in December, placing the 2027 Microsoft delivery commitment inside one missed regulatory deadline's reach.