Yes, it can. Under the PJM backstop procurement cost allocation plan refiled on Oct. 29, a factory with no data center nearby could still carry part of the bill. Three things decide it: the plant's zone, its state's retail tariff and its supply contract. FERC has not ruled on the proposal, which APPA reported on Oct. 30 as a filing at the commission, and PJM is targeting a March 1, 2027 start.
The size of the purchase explains why operators should care. The Reliability Backstop Procurement (RBP) is a one-time buy against the 6,831 MW shortfall from the 2028/2029 Base Residual Auction, a figure PJM will recalculate with updated information. Commitments run up to 15 years, with a maximum willingness to pay of a MW-weighted average of $555/MW-day, according to PJM's Oct. 29 Inside Lines post. That auction cleared at the $325/MW-day cap across PJM. APPA put cleared supply times price at $16.4 billion and cautioned that this "does not equate to the total cost to load," because hedged load is not exposed to auction prices.
PJM's post lists a proposed 2027 schedule: the bid window closes March 28, the final target and supply are set April 28, and results are posted May 10.
What changed in PJM's Oct. 29 refiling?
PJM moved the wholesale split from each zone's share of the procurement target to firm Large Load growth. Costs would go to load-serving entities (LSEs) based on Large Load growth between the 2026 actual summer peak and the 2028/2029 forecast.
Under the original design, Utility Dive reported, zones paid pro rata to their share of the target, and LSEs paid within each zone. Consumer advocates warned that households and other existing customers could pay if states did not shift costs to data centers, Inside Climate News reported. The same report said none of seven Maryland data center projects in the relevant forecast had a formal utility agreement.
FERC's Sept. 29 order (196 FERC ¶ 61,245) accepted most of the plan but suspended it for five months. "PJM has not demonstrated that reliance on the Load Adjustment process is just and reasonable," the commission wrote, and it suggested allocating on the difference between actual 2026/2027 load and the latest 2028/2029 forecast. Troutman Pepper Locke summarized the order as encouraging a new filing.
One distinction matters here. Utility Dive reported FERC said updated forecasts could capture "all forecasted load growth." PJM's refiled metric is narrower: Large Load growth specifically.
APPA identified three changed elements: how RBP charges are allocated to LSEs, LSE credit requirements and LSE exit responsibilities. EnerKnol also reported on the revised plan.
Does a zone with no large load growth pay for the backstop?
On our reading of PJM's summary, a zone with no firm Large Load growth should carry little or nothing at the wholesale step. That is ManufacturingMag's inference from PJM's description, not language from the filing.
PJM says electric distribution companies supply firm Large Load growth, which is assigned to each zone by its contribution. Its Oct. 22 slides described the data as "firm customer level (service agreements) Large Loads" and added: "Customer level offsets will still be available to determine the final allocation."
The word "firm" looks like a direct response to the Maryland problem of forecast projects without utility agreements, though that is also our reading. The practical test for a plant is its zone. Distance from a server hall does not matter: a factory in a zone with counted growth shares that zone's pool until a state or a contract says otherwise.
Why does PJM's allocation stop at the load-serving entity?
PJM bills wholesale customers, and retail allocation belongs to the states. The PJM Board's July 27 letter said, "Because PJM does not have jurisdiction to allocate retail costs directly to individual data centers," "state action will be essential." FERC's order said "states determine how Commission-approved rates are collected among the relevant retail consumers," and that it "will not pretend that all of these issues can be solved exclusively by market design in the federal sphere." Latham & Watkins likewise noted that LSE-to-load allocation is a matter of state law.
An LSE is the utility serving a customer or the competitive supplier that replaced it. PJM's charge lands on that entity, not the plant. What reaches the factory then depends on the retail tariff it takes service under or the terms of its supply contract.
PJM's July 31 filing built the state role into a new "RBP Obligation," or RBO: the state and/or RERRA-determined allocation of cleared RBP MW to LSEs, reported to PJM by Electric Distributors. A RERRA is the relevant state or local retail regulator. The filing said this "permits states and/or RERRAs to rely on their own, disparate definitions of data centers and large loads" (p. 98). PJM "would not, under the proposed methodology, determine any further allocation to retail customers served by those LSEs" (p. 99).
How could a factory with no data center ties end up paying?
The clearest path in the July 31 filing is its back-up rule. If RBOs are not reported, "PJM will allocate RBP Charges based on the Peak Load Contribution submitted to PJM for the LSEs in the relevant zone/area" (p. 99). That filing required initial RBOs "no later than 60 days prior to the 2028/2029" Delivery Year (p. 120), which by our arithmetic is about April 2, 2028 for a June 1 start.
Peak Load Contribution (PLC) does not sort customers by what they make. A whitepaper posted by PJM says RPM capacity obligations rest on contributions to PJM's five coincident peak hours. Under a PLC-based spread, a plant running through those hours would count the same way as any other load in the zone. As we read it, an industrial load that holds steady through peak hours would carry more than one that drops load in them.
The July filing also shows how the money moves. Pay-as-bid resources settle as a contract for difference against the RPM price: "The buyer (load) must pay the difference between the strike price and market price" (p. 80). Load receives daily RBP Charges (p. 82). If an LSE defaults, PJM reallocates the unpaid amount to the remaining LSEs in the zone (p. 89), so one failed supplier's share can move onto others.
Industrial groups saw this coming. FERC's order records the PJM Industrial Customer Coalition (PJMICC in the order) arguing that without state methodologies, "retail cost protections for existing customers will inevitably fail." In a June 22 letter, the coalition, Pennsylvania's Consumer Advocate and Illinois CUB said states "will only succeed" with wholesale tools from PJM.
Can a manufacturing plant count as a Large Load?
Yes. In a separate docket, FERC's Oct. 9 order accepted a Large Load definition effective Oct. 12, 2026, that covers all load types: "end-use customer(s) load that has a cumulative peak load of 50 [MW] or greater at a single electrical site." All affiliated load facilities within a one-mile radius count as one site. FERC said the definition "includes all Large Loads regardless of the in-service date."
Efforts to carve out manufacturers failed in that order. FirstEnergy urged a 200 MW threshold or a data-center-only definition to avoid "small and medium-sized manufacturing facilities." EKPC argued industrial load does not "present the same timing, concentration, or operational risks as data centers." FERC said the 50 MW line "strikes a just and reasonable balance." It rejected a separate "New Large Load" definition, as Utility Dive also reported.
Ohio regulators took the manufacturers' side. PUCO asked FERC on Sept. 3 to limit the new-large-load definition to data centers and crypto miners. Chair Jenifer French said "it is counterproductive to place additional constraints on traditional manufacturers and other non-data center large loads."
State lines can sit well below PJM's. The whitepaper, dated September 2026, puts ComEd's Extra Large Load class above 10 MW and describes a Maryland test of 25 MW with a load factor above 60%, explicitly covering "Data centers and other large industrial consumers." Depending on where a state draws its line, a high-load-factor plant could sit with the customers being protected or with the customers being assigned costs.
Which tariff lines should plant managers watch?
The retail answer will be written in these documents. PJM entries come from the July 31 filing and the June 22 letter. State entries come from the whitepaper as of September 2026, unless noted.
| Layer | Item | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| PJM | RBP Charges | Daily charges to load in the July filing, settled as a contract for difference against the RPM price |
| PJM | Attachment DD sections 18.3 and 18.8, as numbered in the July filing | Section references to give counsel or a supplier when reviewing the July text |
| PJM | RAA Schedule 8 back-up | The July filing's PLC-based spread when RBOs are not reported |
| PJM | Billing line item and subaccounts | Requested in the June 22 letter, along with per-customer data on large loads behind each zone's target |
| Pennsylvania | Executive Order 2026-05, PUC Model Tariff, PPL LP-6 | The order directs work to ensure "data centers pay costs associated with PJM reliability backstop auctions." The whitepaper says it directs the PUC to prevent EDCs charging non-data center customers, while Greenberg Traurig notes it "does not bind the PUC." Model Tariff threshold: 50 MW individually or 100 MW in aggregate. PPL LP-6: 50 MW at a single facility |
| Ohio | AEP Schedule DCT | Data center tariffs mostly at 25 MW, with DCT above 25 MW monthly maximum demand. The whitepaper recommends defining RBP and RPM UCAP as separate capacity products with their own allocation procedures. PUCO's Aug. 21 comments said data centers should bear RBP costs |
| Maryland | HB 1532 | The whitepaper says it "requires direct assignment of RBP capacity and prohibits other customers from subsidizing large load customers" |
| Delaware | HB 233 | 75 MW at 85% or higher load factor |
| Virginia | GS-5 | 25 MW at 75% or higher load factor. The whitepaper says the SCC should develop an RBP allocation methodology for large loads |
| Illinois | ComEd Extra Large Load class | Above 10 MW, the lowest threshold in this list |
| New Jersey | AB 796 | The bill to track. The whitepaper's New Jersey section says PJM's proposed tariffs leave RBP cost allocation to the states |
Public power customers have a separate item. PJM and APPA say the refiling removes the municipal and cooperative opt-out, and a Peak Shaving Adjustment opt-out now needs a plan of at least five years. An LSE exiting PJM stays responsible for RBP charges for the rest of the commitment term. Babst Calland noted Fixed Resource Requirement utilities were excluded under the original proposal. It also reported that FERC questioned the original $1.5 million per committed MW collateral rate, and PJM's post now cites a "revised lower uniform credit rate."
How much could the backstop cost a plant?
This is a ManufacturingMag worksheet, not PJM's formula. It borrows the PLC logic from the July filing's back-up rule, so it fits a plant sharing a zone's pool with no state allocation in place.
Rough annual plant share = (plant PLC ÷ zone total PLC) × zone RBP MW × net $/MW-day × 365
Start with the system-wide outer bounds, which are our arithmetic:
-
Gross: 6,831 MW × $555 × 365 = about $1.38 billion a year.
-
Net: at an unchanged $325 RPM price, the contract for difference leaves $230/MW-day, or about $573 million a year.
Both are ceiling-style cases. They assume the full target, an average at the $555 cap and a flat RPM price. The target will be recalculated, and it falls by qualifying MW in executed bilateral contracts between Large Loads and suppliers. A higher RPM price would also shrink the net figure. PJM's Market Monitor argued that the shortfall would fall to 3,055 MW after data center cancellations and delays, and that including all loads "is unduly discriminatory."
To show the math with round numbers that are not an estimate for any zone: a plant with a 10 MW PLC in a zone with 10,000 MW of total PLC and 500 MW of assigned RBP would hold 0.5 MW. At $230/MW-day, that is about $42,000 a year. At the gross $555, it is about $101,000.
ManufacturingMag is not publishing a zone estimate here. The one zone-level marker in our reporting reflects the original allocation: Maryland's OPC estimated up to $562 million over 15 years for Maryland consumers at full target and maximum price, with PJM's initial Maryland assignment at 135.4 MW (Potomac Edison 116.5 MW, BGE 18.9 MW), Inside Climate News reported. Treat that as a sense of scale, since the refiled method changes the basis.
What should manufacturers do now?
-
Identify your zone and your PLC. Get both from your utility or supplier, then run the worksheet at the net and gross prices as a sensitivity, not a forecast.
-
Add up affiliated load within one mile. Compare the total with 50 MW, then with your state's threshold and load-factor test, which may be lower.
-
Read your supply contract. Pull the pass-through and change-in-law language. If you buy from a utility, read the retail tariff you take service under.
-
Get into the state docket. The retail split is decided at the state commission, so file or join its large-load tariff docket through an industrial group. The definitions there determine which side of the line your plant falls on.
-
Ask your public power provider about its position if you buy from a municipal utility or cooperative, given the opt-out changes.
The Department of Energy has also pressed PJM on large-load cost responsibility, and Ohio, Pennsylvania and Maryland have each moved toward assigning these costs to data centers. For a plant manager, the decision that counts will be how your own state defines a large load and how your own contract treats a new charge.
Related reading
Sources
-
PJM Inside Lines, Oct. 29, 2026 post on the amended RBP filing
-
FERC order accepting and suspending the RBP, 196 FERC ¶ 61,245 (Sept. 29, 2026)
-
APPA: PJM Files Amended Reliability Backstop Proposal at FERC
-
National Law Review (Babst Calland): FERC Suspends PJM's Reliability Backstop Auction
-
Troutman Pepper Locke: Washington Energy Report on FERC's RBP order
-
Inside Climate News: Maryland Consumer Advocate Challenges PJM Plan
-
Pennsylvania Governor's Office press release (Oct. 16, 2026)
-
Greenberg Traurig: Gov. Shapiro Issues Executive Order 2026-05
-
Latham & Watkins: White House and Governors Issue Principles