On October 19, 2017, FERC accepted modifications to the Midcontinent Independent System Operator, Inc.’s (“MISO”) Open Access Transmission, Energy, and Operating Reserve Markets Tariff (“Tariff”), subject to certain conditions and further compliance in response to FERC’s January 3, 2017 order (“January 3 Order”) directing MISO to modify certain provisions of its Generator Interconnection Procedures concerning how MISO provides interconnection service to two classes of interconnection customers.  

In a policy statement issued October 19, 2017, FERC revised its longstanding approach to setting the license terms for hydroelectric projects.  The new policy establishes a default term of 40 years for non-federal projects.  The default term can be shortened or extended in certain identified circumstances.

On October 19, 2017, FERC ordered Southwest Power Pool, Inc. (“SPP”) to revise its Open Access Transmission Tariff (“OATT”) to provide that network customers with service subject to redispatch can only obtain Auction Revenue Rights (“ARRs”) and Long-Term Congestion Rights (“LTCRs”) for those times and in the amounts that service can be provided without redispatch.

On October 13, 2017, a group of transmission owners in the Southwest Power Pool, Inc. (“SPP”) filed a complaint with FERC under Section 206 of the Federal Power Act alleging that SPP’s Open Access Transmission Tariff (“Tariff”) is unjust and unreasonable because it lacks cost-shifting protections when new transmission owners join existing SPP transmission pricing zones.  To correct this alleged “loophole,” the complainants propose a new rate schedule for new transmission owners that are placed into existing zones.

On October 19, 2017, FERC issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (“NOPR”) proposing to direct the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (“NERC”) to modify the Critical Infrastructure Protection (“CIP”) Reliability Standard, CIP-003-7 (Cyber Security – Security Management Controls), which is intended to mitigate cyber security risks posed by malware from ‘transient electronic devices’ (such as laptops and thumb drives) used at low-impact cyber systems.  FERC stated in the NOPR that, once those modifications have been made, it plans to make the new reliability standard effective approximately 18 months after FERC approval.

On October 6, 2017, FERC approved the New York Independent System Operator, Inc. (“NYISO”) and PJM Interconnection, L.L.C.’s (“PJM”; together with NYISO, “RTOs”) revisions to their Joint Operating Agreement (“JOA”), and NYISO’s revisions to its Market Administration and Control Area Services Tariff (“Tariff”), that address interchange schedule and Market-to-Market (“M2M”) coordination at the ABC and JK Interfaces on the border of northern New Jersey and southeastern New York.  Specifically, FERC found that the RTOs’ proposal to implement a wheeling arrangement over a newly formed PJM-NY AC Proxy Bus and to establish an Operational Base Flow (“OBF”) over the Interfaces was just and reasonable.

On October 6, 2017, FERC rejected the New England transmission owners’ (“NETOs”) amended compliance filing to reinstate their previous FERC-issued returns on equity (“ROE”), which were lowered due to a now-vacated FERC order.  FERC found that reinstating the original ROE would complicate the backdating process for which refunds or surcharges would be ordered and instead ordered the NETOs to continue collecting under their current, pending ROEs.

On October 6, 2017, FERC rejected without prejudice Southwest Power Pool, Inc.’s (“SPP”) proposed tariff revisions and a cost sharing agreement related to two transmission projects with Associated Electric Cooperative (“AECI”), a rural electric cooperative that has member cooperatives in Missouri, Iowa, and Oklahoma, and City Utilities of Springfield, Missouri (“City Utilities”), a non-public utility that is a transmission-owning member of SPP.  AECI is not a member of SPP.  FERC found that SPP’s proposal did not allocate the costs of the proposed transmission projects to its beneficiaries in a “roughly commensurate” manner.  For this reason, FERC rejected SPP’s tariff revisions and cost sharing agreement without prejudice.  FERC’s action is notable in that cross-border projects have been few and far between in the post-Order No. 1000 world of transmission planning, and FERC might be expected to tout the success of its planning initiatives.  FERC nonetheless found the cost allocation proposals to have serious shortcomings. 

On October 6, 2017, FERC accepted a tariff filing from ISO New England Inc. (“ISO-NE”) proposing updated calculations for various Forward Capacity Market input values, including Cost of New Entry (“CONE”), Net CONE, and Offer Review Trigger Price (“ORTP”).  As part of its order, FERC also approved ISO-NE’s choice of a simple cycle gas turbine as the reference technology for establishing CONE and Net CONE values—thereby replacing the combined cycle natural gas turbine that had been used as a reference technology by ISO-NE since 2014.

On October 4, 2017, FERC issued two separate orders clarifying its jurisdiction under sections 203 and 205 of the Federal Power Act (“FPA”) related to certain project development activities.  In Ad Hoc Renewable Energy Financing Group, FERC granted a petition for declaratory order and confirmed that certain tax equity interests in public utilities do not constitute “voting securities” for purposes of FPA section 203 and therefore do not require prior FERC approval.  Separately, in ALLETE, Inc., FERC disclaimed jurisdiction under FPA section 205 over certain pre-construction activities and thereby found that ALLETE, Inc. did not need to file three pre-construction agreements with the agency.