FERC plans to rule on ISO-NE’s compliance proposal for Order 2023 on or before April 4, the commission announced in a short notice March 31 (ER24-2009, ER24-2007). 

The announcement came on the date of a key deadline for ISO-NE’s compliance timeline after repeated requests for rapid action by state officials and generation developers. 

ISO-NE initially requested FERC accept its compliance proposal with an effective date of Aug. 12, 2024. The RTO suspended its work implementing its proposal in October 2024 because of the lack of a ruling from FERC. (See With FERC Inaction, ISO-NE Delays Order 2023 Implementation.) 

In recent months, stakeholders have voiced worries the delay may hinder resource development in the region and increase prices in upcoming capacity auctions. (See New England Clean Energy Developers Struggle with Order 2023 Uncertainty.) 

Some stakeholders have expressed particular concern about the fate of ISO-NE’s proposed transitional capacity network resource (CNR) group study, which is intended to enable late-stage projects with complete system impact studies to achieve capacity interconnection rights.

In its original filing, ISO-NE wrote that the transitional CNR study, set to occur prior to the transitional cluster study (which would include all other interconnection requests), “avoids the need to include these requests in the transitional cluster study, thereby creating efficiencies by reducing the number of requests included in that study.” 

ISO-NE said it would need an order by the end of March to align the transitional CNR study with the 2025 Interim Reconfiguration Auction Qualification process, which includes a show-of-interest submission deadline at the end of April. But in late March, ISO-NE told stakeholders it likely would not be able to proceed with the transitional CNR study. (See ISO-NE to Reopen Queue as it Continues to Wait on Ruling from FERC.) 

In response to FERC’s announcement, an ISO-NE spokesperson said the RTO will assess its options once the order is issued.  

ISO-NE also confirmed it reopened the interconnection queue April 1. The queue had been closed since June 13, 2024, which is the RTO’s proposed deadline for projects to have a valid interconnection request to participate in the transitional cluster. 

It is unclear if projects that enter the queue after this date will be eligible for the cluster, and ISO-NE has said it “cannot guarantee the treatment of [interconnection requests] submitted after the June 13, 2024, eligibility date.” 

Alex Lawton of Advanced Energy United said FERC’s announcement “has given us renewed hope that the ISO can reverse course and proceed with the transitional CNR group study as previously planned. Should the FERC order largely accept the compliance filing, we are confident the ISO will explore how to proceed in a manner that causes the fewest delays and resembles our stakeholder-supported original plan as much as possible.”