PJM Interconnection, North America’s largest Regional Transmission Operator (RTO), is mulling changes to interconnection reliability requirements for data centers and cryptocurrency mining facilities following a mass outage in Virginia late last month.
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The outage occurred on July 22 and originated in northern Virginia, which is home to the highest concentration of data centers globally.
Reports at the time indicated that a transmission line went out of operation on the morning of the 22nd, prompting data centers in the area to disconnect their own systems from the grid and switch to backup power, according to Dominion Energy, the utility serving the region.
The outage brought nearly 4GW of data center capacity offline, and according to the RTO, it was the largest incident experienced across its footprint.
