Ameren Missouri wants to build a new electric substation in Boone County designed to support the area’s current electricity needs and anticipated growth.
Electric substations connect to powerlines and facilitate electricity moving across the grid. If approved by state regulators, Ameren plans to build the substation southwest of Columbia, on land the company already owns, early next year.
Ameren Project Manager Jeana Woodard said the new substation has two extra connection points to support additional power production in the future. The substation is named Katy, after the nearby Katy Trail, which was named after the former railroad.
“The Katy substation is to strengthen the reliability of the transmission system in central Missouri, and it will help reduce the impact of power outages and accommodate future growth,” Woodard said.
The new substation, which connects to transmission lines, is part of the Midcontinent Independent System Operator's, or "MISO," Transmission Expansion Plan. MISO is the regional transmission operator that helps identify energy needs for central and northeast Missouri, along with some or all of 14 other states.
The Katy substation will divide an existing transmission line into two sections, Ameren spokesperson Evan Asher said. If there’s an issue on one section, it could be isolated, reducing the potential for an outage to impact the rest of the transmission line.
Ameren is expanding electric power plants and infrastructure throughout the state to support increased demand largely brought on by artificial intelligence data centers. The company’s latest plans show it expects 5 gigawatts of electricity demand from “large load” customers such as AI data centers by 2035. One gigawatt of electricity production can power approximately 876,000 households.
The Missouri Public Service Commission regulates Ameren and other investor-owned utility companies in the state. The commission is expected to respond to Ameren’s Katy substation request by the end of February.
