On Thursday, February 21, 2013, FERC issued a Final Rule approving a new regional reliability standard, PRC-006-NPCC-1, designed to ensure the development of an effective automatic underfrequency load shedding (“UFLS”) program in the Northeast Power Coordinating Council (“NPCC”) Region.The NPCC Region includes the states of New York, Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, as well as the Canadian provinces of Ontario, Québec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.  In approving the new regional standard, FERC also approved the related violation risk factors, violation severity levels, implementation plan, and effective dates.

Regional Reliability Standard PRC-006-NPPC-1 applies to all generator owners, planning coordinators, distribution providers and transmission owners in the NPCC Region, to ensure that the security and integrity of the Bulk-Power System during declining system frequency events is preserved.  The regional standard was developed to work in coordination with the North American Electric Reliability Corporation’s (“NERC”) continent-wide UFLS Reliability Standard PRC-006-1.  In the order, FERC represents that Regional Reliability Standard PRC-006-NPCC-1 is more rigorous than Reliability Standard PRC-006-1, and includes additional requirements targeted to address regional specific issues.  Together, the reliability standards are intended to accommodate differences in transmission and distribution systems found among NPCC planning coordinators, while effectively mitigating the consequences of underfrequency events.

To view the order, click here.

To view the reliability standard, click here.