ORLANDO, Fla. — The NERC Operating Committee approved the following in meetings Tuesday and Wednesday:

• The Resources Subcommittee’s revised reliability guideline on primary frequency control under BAL-001-TRE-1 and PRC-001-WECC-CRT-2. Originally published in 2015, the guideline’s definitions were updated and the section on recovery periods was expanded. Applicable to: balancing authorities, generator operators (GOPs), generator owners (GOs), transmission operators (TOPs) and transmission owners.
• The Data Exchange Information Requirements Task Force’s compliance guidance on data exchange infrastructure and testing requirements under TOP-001-4 R20, R21, R23 and R24, and IRO-002-5 R2 and R3. Includes clarification of “redundant and diversely routed” language and testing requirements. Applicable to: TOPs, BAs and reliability coordinators.
• The Real–time Assessments Quality Task Force’s compliance implementation guidance on the quality of analysis used in completion of a real-time assessment under TOP-010-1(i) R3 and IRO-018-1(i) R2. Applicable to: TOPs, RCs and applicable supporting entities.

The committee also authorized the posting of the Event Analysis Subcommittee’s revised ERO Events Analysis Process for a 45-day industry comment period. Version 4.0 adds: information on weather-related events; references to inverter-based resources in Categories 3 and 4 events; and expanded appendices. Applicable to regional entities and registered entities (e.g., TOs, GOs, load-serving entities).

IRPTF Scope Document Remanded

Task force Chair Allen Schriver, of NextEra Energy, said the new document was a spinoff of the group’s September 2018 reliability guideline: BPS-Connected Inverter-Based Resource Performance.

“The [inverter] manufacturers kept telling us, ‘Nobody told us what they wanted.’ … So we wrote this performance guideline, and industry came back to us and said, ‘Can you turn that into interconnection requirements?’”

Schriver said the new document recommends improvements to both performance and modeling requirements. “Modeling is still an issue we have with solar sites in providing the correct models for how the site operates,” he said.

The committee postponed a vote on a revised scope document for the task force. OC Chair Lloyd Linke said he, Planning Committee Chair Brian Evans-Mongeon and task force leaders agreed that “the product of the task force is still too vaguely defined.”

Rich Bauer, NERC’s associate director of reliability risk management-event analysis, suggested the committee consider converting the task force into a working group, saying there is no clear end to the task force’s work.

“What we discovered was, once we got the task force together and we started talking about momentary cessation, every time we talked about something … there’s something else that crops up that we didn’t know, we didn’t understand, that we need to have more work on,” he said. “Inverter-based resources are changing our lives in the way that we operate the system. … The work that we’re doing is not just a specific function with borders. It is a body of work that is ongoing, at least for the near future.”

Linke’s Poignant Farewell

Linke received a standing ovation from the committee after concluding the final meeting of his two-year term as chair. The Western Area Power Administration vice president of operations choked up as he recalled his tenure.

He said the IRPTF’s high-profile work in response to the Blue Cut Fire and work by other special task groups “overshadowed a lot of our normal day-to-day activities in ensuring reliability.”

“I’m just hoping that … we’re still able to do the reliability work we’ve done in the past,” after the proposed reorganization that could combine the OC with the Planning Committee and the Critical Infrastructure Protection Committee. (See “Potential Change to Committee Structure,” NERC MRC, Trustees Meeting Briefs: May 8-9, 2019.)

Asked after the meeting whether he feared the committee’s role could be diminished, Linke responded, “The devil is in the details.”

“That process can move forward and be totally successful. I don’t have any doubts about that,” he continued. “But it’s also going to lead to a period of turmoil, which all change creates. And … how that group deals with that turmoil and drives through that turmoil would have an impact on their capabilities. The key is in the subcommittees. As long as the activities of the subcommittees is not significantly disturbed, [it will be OK].”

MISO’s David Zwergel was elected to succeed Linke as chair for 2019-2021. Doug Hils of Duke Energy was elected to succeed Zwergel as vice chair.

Nominations for the annual OC election will be accepted through June 24.