Jenna McGrath

Primary Focus & Experience

Ms. McGrath focuses her practice on both transactional and litigation work in the energy regulatory space. She advises developers, lenders, private equity, utilities and large industrial electricity customers (e.g., data centers and mining operations) on laws and regulations governing development of electric generation and transmission projects, and revenues for wholesale and retail electricity and transmission services.  She regularly appears before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), state public utility commissions and courts in matters concerning regulatory compliance, project development and ratemaking, generator interconnection, RTO/ISO market rules and energy market behavior investigations. Her prior representations include extensive work with transmission and generation project developers, electric cooperative utilities and private equity investments in the domestic energy space. Ms. McGrath is experienced in emerging technologies and non-traditional business models, including merchant transmission, distributed generation and demand response aggregation, microgrids, all scales of electric storage and fuel cells.

Her recent significant representations include:

• advising on regulatory matters for many of the most significant power-related transactions (solar, wind, storage, hydro and conventional) in the US.*
• several retail utilities in FERC, public utility commission and state court proceedings involving long-term wholesale power purchase arrangements.*
• a Mexican industrial automotive manufacturer in securing Department of Energy Import/Export authorizations to transact as a power marketer in ERCOT, and in negotiating related agreements.*
• Caithness Energy in the sale of 845 MW Shepherd’s Flat Wind Farm.*
• GlidePath Development and GlidePath Power Solutions in a broad range of electric storage and renewable generation matters, including the first cost-based reactive power rate proceeding for a lithium-ion electric storage resource at FERC.*
• GridLiance Heartland LLC  on FERC matters associated with its entry into the Midcontinent Independent System Operator market as a transmission-only utility.*
• GridLiance West LLC in FERC proceedings and transactional matters associated with its $200-million strategic acquisition of high-voltage transmission assets and entry into the California Independent System Operator market as a transmission-only utility.*
• several wholesale transmission-owning utilities in RTO/ISO integration proceedings, including contested settlement and litigation.*
• merchant transmission owner Cross-Sound Cable Company in ISO-NE stakeholder and FERC proceedings for cost-of-service recovery of cybersecurity investments.*
• Colony Capital in its partnership with Vantage Data Centers valued at $3.5 billion, including diligence and transactional support on complex transaction structure for investments in hyperscale data center operations in California, Washington State and Québec.*
• GI Partners in its acquisition of a majority interest in Hawaii’s largest data center operator (DR Fortress) and in its $1.7 billion acquisition of ViaWest., including diligence and transactional support for data center acquisitions.*

*Matter completed prior to joining Milbank.

Recognition & Accomplishments

Jenna McGrath was recognized in 2022 as a “Rising Star” by The Legal 500 for her work in both conventional and renewable power, and she is also recognized as a rising star by Chambers USA for her regulatory and litigation work in the electricity sector.