FERC Chairman Richard Glick began cleaning house Thursday during his first open meeting at the agency’s helm, refreshing the commission’s work on several issues while closing the books on others.

Most notably, the commission issued another Notice of Inquiry seeking comment on revising its 1999 policy statement on natural gas pipeline certificates, a review that began under Chairman Kevin McIntyre in April 2018 (PL18-1).

FERC eventually received more than 3,000 comments in response to the original NOI. (See FERC Flooded with Comments on Pipeline Permitting.) But until Thursday, the docket had sat untouched.

Since then, the commission said, there have been numerous changes in U.S. environmental policy, including the Trump administration’s rules intended to speed up the National Environmental Policy Act review process and President Biden’s executive orders on climate change. (See Trump Admin Proposes Streamlining NEPA Reviews and Biden Signs Sweeping Climate Orders.)

“We are providing an opportunity for stakeholders to refresh the record and provide updated information and additional viewpoints to help the commission assess its policy,” FERC said. “We seek comments that reflect additional information developed and insights gained during the interim period.”

The commission stressed that it would consider previously submitted comments in the docket and urged stakeholders not to simply refile them.

The topics on which the commission is seeking information remain the same:

• the reliance on precedent agreements to demonstrate project need, and how contracts with pipeline affiliates should be treated;
• landowner interests and the use of eminent domain;
• the evaluation of alternatives and environmental effects under NEPA and the Natural Gas Act; and
• the efficiency and effectiveness of the commission’s certificate processes.

But FERC also wants comments on another broad topic: “the commission’s identification and addressing of any disproportionately high and adverse human health or environmental effects of its programs, policies and activities on environmental justice communities and the mitigation of those adverse impacts and burdens.”

FERC explained that environmental justice communities include those of color and low income, which are particularly vulnerable to pollution and the effects of climate change.

Glick gained unanimous support for the new NOI, comments on which are due 60 days after publication in the Federal Register, though Commissioner James Danly’s was tepid.

“I, for one, don’t believe there is any need whatsoever to revisit our certificate policy,” Danly said. “But there’s certainly nothing legally infirm about the commission examining its policies and asking questions. I don’t have any particular point to make about the substance of the NOI other than to say that it’s obviously rather contentious, and I will likely oppose most of the initiatives that the chairman is likely to embark upon.”

But Danly also praised Glick for seeking his input and incorporating his requested edits, even though he knew that he did not support the effort.

Next Chapter on RTO Capacity Markets

FERC on Thursday also turned the page in the saga of electricity capacity markets, ending several proceedings while also promising to take a new look.

The meeting marked the end of one of the most contentious issues at FERC over the past few years, PJM’s minimum offer price rule (MOPR), with the commission vacating the infamous Footnote 134 (EL16-49-006, et al.).

FERC in October accepted PJM’s compliance plan to expand the MOPR to include new state-subsidized resources. In accepting the compliance filing, the commission also clarified that resources procured in state-directed default service auctions are not subject to the expanded MOPR. However, a footnote in the order caused confusion among stakeholders, leading to a rehearing request from several generating companies who said the footnote’s language conflicted with that of the order itself.

On Thursday, the commission said it agreed and vacated the footnote.

Danly dissented; at his last meeting as chair last month, he had proposed issuing an order that his colleagues, including predecessor Neil Chatterjee, rejected, saying it would only cause further confusion. (See FERC Ends Trump Era with a Busy Agenda.)

“I believe that FERC has both the right and the obligation to protect their jurisdictional markets from the price-suppressive effects of state policies,” Danly said. “I think that to have anything but a bright line against the participation of subsidized resources is simply an error and a dereliction of our duty to keep the markets properly insulated from the effects of those policies. … To vacate [Footnote 134] now … imperils the integrity of the market and also does not honor the earlier decision that the commission made.”

Similarly, FERC partly backed off an order in NYISO’s buyer-sider mitigation rules proceeding, ruling that commercial demand response resources are exempt from the rules. (See related story, FERC Backtracks on NYISO BSM Exemptions.) The commission also ended its long languishing docket on grid resilience, with Glick saying the issue was best handled regionally. (See related story, Glick Eyes New Standards Following Midwest Outages.)

But Glick also announced the commission would hold a series of technical conferences on modernizing capacity market design, beginning with PJM’s next month and continuing with ISO-NE and NYISO. After that, the commission will examine modernizing energy and ancillary services markets.