The Texas Reliability Entity will spend much of this year working on issues related to the fallout from the February extreme weather that almost collapsed the ERCOT grid.

First-year Texas RE CEO Jim Albright said during the organization’s board meeting Wednesday that three staffers will be working with NERC and FERC on their joint inquiry into the February winter storms that led to outages in ERCOT, MISO and SPP. FERC would like to release key findings in September, he said.

“This is going to be pretty fast and furious work,” Albright said. “Every region is involved, even those not involved in the event. We want to learn from this and hopefully not see a similar situation occur.”

He also told the board that NERC is considering accelerating the schedule for its cold weather standard project (Project 2019-06). Poorly insulated power plants and natural gas infrastructure have been blamed for knocking out significant portions of generation.

The cold-weather proposal could go before the ERO’s Board of Trustees in June. (See NERC Cold Weather Team to Seek Faster Finish.)

Board Fills Committee Slots

The board, meeting for the first time this year, filled out a pair of committees for 2021.

The Hearing Body, a non-standing committee that meets only if a contested case hearing is requested, will comprise independent Directors Crystal Ashby and Jeffrey Corbett and affiliated Director Curt Brockmann.

The three directors will also serve on the Director Compensation Committee along with Albright and Liz Jones, chair of the Member Representatives Committee.

Board Chair Milton Lee welcomed Corbett and Suzanne Spaulding to their first Texas RE board meeting.