What is Interconnection Queue?
The public list, maintained by a regional transmission operator (ISO/RTO such as PJM, MISO, CAISO, ERCOT), of generators and large loads requesting permanent connection to the electrical grid. An interconnection request is filed 12–36 months before a facility needs power, making it one of the earliest reliable signals of a large project.
In day-to-day BD work, the interconnection queue is the earliest place a large project shows up under a real name at a real point on the grid. Each entry lists a requested capacity, a county or substation, a requested in-service date, and a developer entity — often a project-specific LLC that can be traced back to its parent. Because the request must be filed years before power flows, a queue entry precedes permits, contractor selection, and press coverage.
A concrete example: a 300 MW load request appears in a grid operator's queue for a rural county with cheap land and a new highway interchange. No data center has been announced. Twelve months later a rezoning application lands at the county, and eighteen months later the building permit is filed. Teams that flagged the queue entry had a year of lead time to map the site, identify the likely owner, and open relationships.
For contractors, that lead time is the difference between shaping a pursuit and reacting to one. Most queue entries never get built, so the skill is weighting entries by study progress, deposits, and site control — not treating every row as a project.