Reliability

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On September 14, 2017, the Subcommittee on Energy of the United States House of Representatives Committee on Energy and Commerce held a hearing on defining reliability in a transforming electricity industry.  During the hearing, committee members raised concerns about reliability and grid transformation in the face of cybersecurity threats and extreme weather.  FERC Chairman Neil Chatterjee testified at the hearing that FERC would continue its role in ensuring “world-class reliability” during this grid transformation. 

On July 23, 2017, the Southwest Power Pool, Inc. (“SPP”) Board of Directors and Members Committee voted to authorize SPP President and Chief Executive Officer Nick Brown to terminate the Regional Delegation Agreement (“RDA”) between SPP and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (“NERC”), which would effectively dissolve the SPP Regional Entity (“SPP RE”)—an independent and functionally separate division of SPP.  The SPP RE Trustees approved a resolution on July 24, 2017, endorsing the decision.

On June 20, 2017, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (“D.C. Circuit” or “the court”) rejected petitions for review challenging FERC’s approval of capacity market rules set by the PJM Interconnection, LLC (“PJM”) in 2014.  The D.C. Circuit held that FERC’s approval of the rules was adequately explained and within its statutory authority under the Federal Power Act.  In particular, the D.C. Circuit rejected assertions from various environmental, clean energy, and public utility petitioners that the new capacity market rules unduly discriminated against variable energy resources.

On June 8, 2017, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (“NERC”) released a report on the August 2016 Blue Cut Fire, which resulted in the loss of 1,200 megawatts (“MW”) of solar photovoltaic (“PV”) power generation.  NERC’s report contains recommendations for avoiding similar incidents by reconfiguring solar inverters, the devices that convert solar energy from direct current to alternating current.

On February 21, 2017, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (“NERC”) submitted its annual risk-based Compliance Monitoring and Enforcement Program (“CMEP”) report to FERC. In the report, NERC reviewed the CMEP’s progress for 2016 and proposed two enhancements to improve the program’s efficiencies and effectiveness. Specifically, NERC proposed (1) discontinuing the requirement that registered entities publicly-post their noncompliance logs and (2) expanding the use of Compliance Exceptions (“CEs”) to include certain moderate-risk noncompliance issues. NERC asserted that the proposed enhancements would allow the CMEP to better target higher-risk issues that can impact the reliability of the bulk power system.

On January 19, 2017, FERC approved Reliability Standard BAL-002-2, Disturbance Control Standard—Contingency Reserve for Recovery from a Balancing Contingency Event, which is designed to “ensure that balancing authorities and reserve sharing groups balance resources and demand and return their Area Control Error to defined values following a Reportable Balancing Contingency Event.” In doing so, FERC also directed the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (“NERC”) to: (1) collect and report on data regarding additional energy losses following Reportable Balancing Contingency Events during the Contingency Reserve Restoration Period; and (2) study and report on reliability risks associated with energy losses above the most severe single contingency that do not cause energy emergencies.

In December, 2016, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (“NERC”) released its 2016 Long-Term Reliability Assessment (“LTRA”). Among its key findings, NERC projected that the capacity reserve margin—the primary metric used to measure resource adequacy—would fall below its target level in the Midcontinent Independent System Operator, Inc. (“MISO”) region, and could also fall below its target level in the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (“ERCOT”) region, depending on the outcome of certain pending regulatory proceedings. NERC also made a number of recommendations designed to address identified reliability issues.

On October 3, 2016, FERC denied La Paloma Generating Company, LLC’s (“La Paloma”) complaint (“Complaint”) requesting that FERC order the California Independent System Operator Corporation (“CAISO”) to designate the portion of La Paloma’s generating capacity that is not currently designated as resource adequacy capacity as reliability must-run (“RMR”) units.

On September 22, 2016, the Commission approved Reliability Standard TPL-007-1 (Transmission System Planned Performance for Geomagnetic Disturbance Events), which establishes for the first time mandatory requirements for Transmission Owners and other entities to assess the vulnerability of transmission systems to geomagnetic disturbance events (“GMDs”), which occur when the sun ejects charged particles that cause changes in the earth’s magnetic fields. The Standard requires that entities who do not meet certain performance requirements, based on the results of their vulnerability assessments, develop a plan to achieve those performance requirements. The Commission also affirmed that recovery for prudent costs to comply with TPL-007-1, including for the purchase and installation of monitoring devices, will be available to registered entities.