Collaborative Approaches to Transmission Development: Lessons from Citizens Energy and SDG&E

As North America’s electric grid evolves to support greater renewable energy integration, electrification, and resilience, utilities and developers are increasingly embracing collaborative approaches to infrastructure development.

New models that align transmission investments with local priorities are helping to create stronger, more affordable, and more resilient communities. Two standout projects in Southern California — the Sunrise Powerlink and the Sycamore-Peñasquitos Transmission Line — demonstrate how a partnership between San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E) and Citizens Energy Corporation has not only strengthened the grid but also delivered meaningful, long-term benefits to the communities hosting these critical assets.

A New Model: Community Collaboration Through Investment

Citizens Energy Corporation, founded by former Congressman Joseph P. Kennedy II, operates on a mission to turn profits from energy-infrastructure investments into programs that assist low-income and underserved populations. Through a unique investment model, Citizens Energy partners with utilities like SDG&E to finance a portion of a transmission project and earns the same returns on that investment as its utility partner.

Citizens then uses at least 50% of its profits from the transmission investment to fund community-focused initiatives that align with local priorities. This partnership model allows Citizens Energy to not only support grid resilience and clean energy but also meet critical social needs by reinvesting profits back into local communities.

Rather than positioning infrastructure development as a challenge to overcome, Citizens’ model views it as an opportunity to build deeper collaboration — strengthening trust, resilience, and affordability for the communities that host critical grid infrastructure. This partnership model sets a new precedent for energy development, where economic and social goals are not mutually exclusive but instead serve to enhance one another.

Sunrise Powerlink: Connecting Renewables, Empowering Families

Completed in 2012, the Sunrise Powerlink is a 500-kV transmission line spanning 117 miles from Imperial County to the San Diego region. The project was designed to deliver clean energy from solar and wind farms in the Imperial Valley to population centers in the San Diego area, significantly improving the region’s access to renewable energy.

Citizens Energy funded 50% of the project’s cost in the Imperial Valley, which enabled the reinvestment of its profits into Imperial County, one of the most economically disadvantaged counties in California. Working with SDG&E and the local municipal utility, the Imperial Irrigation District (IID), Citizens is using its profits to provide both energy affordability and access to renewable energy for thousands of low-income families. Initially, Citizens funded no-cost, rooftop, solar installations for over 650 income-qualified homeowners. Later, to provide benefit to more households, Citizens transitioned to the development of the largest low-income community solar project in the United States, the 39-megawatt eGreen/Citizens-Imperial solar farm, completed in 2018. This solar project has provided vital support to the Imperial Valley community by approximately 12,000 of IID’s low-income customers saving on electricity bills every month.

Key Results of the Sunrise Powerlink & Imperial Solar Farm include:

• Delivers renewable power to over 650,000 homes in California, and enabled development of a 39 MW low-income solar farm.
• 12,000 Low-Income Households Served: Each receiving approximately $350 in annual electricity-bill savings.
• Long-Term Impact: Guaranteed savings over the solar project’s 20+year life, benefiting vulnerable communities.

The Citizens Imperial Solar Farm is part of a broader effort to cost-effectively integrate renewable energy into low-income communities, a group that is often disproportionately affected by energy costs. By aligning infrastructure development with direct community benefits, Citizens Energy and SDG&E helped demonstrate how transmission projects can contribute to both clean-energy goals and local economic resilience. The duration of both the transmission investment (30 years) and the solar project’s design life (20+ years) ensures that the community continues to benefit from energy savings for decades, creating lasting economic relief for families who need it most.

Sycamore-Peñasquitos Transmission Line: Strengthening Reliability, Supporting Local Organizations

Following the success of the Sunrise Powerlink, the partnership between Citizens Energy and SDG&E continued with the Sycamore-Peñasquitos Transmission Line — a 230-kV project that enhances reliability and flexibility in the San Diego area grid, especially as variable renewable resources come online.

Completed in 2019, the Sycamore-Peñasquitos project exemplifies how transmission development can deliver lasting local benefits beyond the wires themselves.

The Sycamore-Peñasquitos line not only improves grid stability in Southern California, but also supports local social and environmental initiatives. Citizens Energy has used profits from its investment in the Sycamore-Peñasquitos line to provide over $13 million of support to organizations advancing environmental stewardship and social services critical to community resilience.

Key Highlights of the Sycamore-Peñasquitos Community Investments:

• Electric-Vehicle Donations: Funding EVs for nonprofit organizations that serve low-income and traditionally marginalized communities.
• Supporting Environmental and Social Initiatives: From wildfire resilience to education and workforce development, these investments are supporting the broader community.
• Partnership for Transportation Electrification: SDG&E has partnered with these organizations through its Transportation Electrification Advisory Services (TEAS) program to build the necessary charging infrastructure for the EVs, helping to reduce emissions and increase local access to clean transportation.

Through these initiatives, Citizens Energy and SDG&E are contributing to the creation of more resilient, sustainable, and equitable communities, ensuring that the benefits of the energy transition are widely shared and felt by all.

Insights for Transmission Development

The transmission-investment model developed by Citizens Energy and SDG&E offers valuable lessons for future grid projects, especially as more utilities and developers look to adopt collaborative approaches that benefit both infrastructure and communities. Several key insights have emerged from these projects:

• Infrastructure and Community Resilience Go Hand-in-Hand - Transmission projects are not just about delivering power — they are about creating resilient, thriving communities. By structuring transmission projects to deliver immediate and lasting benefits to host communities, utilities can support not only environmental stewardship but also economic development, social welfare, and energy affordability.
• Partnership Models Strengthen Project Outcomes - Minority investments by mission-driven partners like Citizens Energy allow utilities to retain operational control while aligning infrastructure improvements with broader community priorities, all without adding costs to ratepayers. This creates a win-win scenario where utilities meet grid-reliability goals while supporting their surrounding communities.
• Scalable Framework for Future Growth - The Citizens model has proven effective across both large regional projects like Sunrise Powerlink and urban-reliability enhancements like Sycamore-Peñasquitos. Its flexibility across different geographies and scales shows that this approach can be scaled to suit a variety of projects, from rural to urban settings.

Extending Community Benefits Across California

In addition to its groundbreaking work with SDG&E, Citizens Energy is also pursuing an innovative partnership with Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E). Under a proposed investment program submitted to the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), Citizens plans to invest up to $1 billion in PG&E’s high-voltage electric system upgrades, using a significant share of its after-tax profits to provide more than $450 million in direct bill-paying assistance to low- and moderate-income PG&E customers over the next 35 years.

This effort reflects a growing commitment to align transmission investment with affordability initiatives, helping to create a more resilient and inclusive energy future for communities across California. This proposed program would benefit PG&E customers by reducing energy costs for families in need, without increasing rates for other customers. It also demonstrates how utility investments can help meet both system reliability and social equity objectives, creating a stronger and more affordable energy future for all.

A Collaborative Path Forward

As the electric grid expands to meet the demands of a cleaner, more electrified economy, partnerships like the one between Citizens Energy and SDG&E show how infrastructure development can serve as a foundation for stronger, healthier, and more resilient communities.

Rather than framing transmission as a project to be “approved,” utilities and developers can view it as a collaborative opportunity — one that builds trust and delivers lasting benefits to local communities. By aligning infrastructure, affordability, and community resilience, Citizens Energy and SDG&E have offered a replicable model for the next generation of transmission development: one that not only connects power but also connects people to opportunity.