By Tom Kleckner

OKLAHOMA CITY — SPP COO Carl Monroe told the Markets and Operations Policy Committee last week that the RTO’s integration of Mountain West Transmission Group is on track to meet its October 2019 consummation timeline, pending reaching final agreement among the various parties.

A small negotiating team tasked with resolving a subset of five “real contentious” issues has reduced the list to two after an initial meeting, Monroe said. He would not elaborate on the issues at play, but Mountain West entities have suggested several governance changes that would emphasize the differences between the two interconnections. (See SPP, Mountain West Integration Work Goes Public.)

Monroe said the team is “intent” on coming up with a recommendation that can be brought back to the Board of Directors and Members Committee here next week. “It does look like we’re getting closer,” he said.

Complicating matters somewhat, Monroe said, was Peak Reliability’s recent announcement that it would work with PJM to offer market services, and CAISO’s desire to offer reliability coordination in its footprint for half the price of Peak. (See CAISO to Depart Peak Reliability, Become RC.)

“That’s created a whole bunch of ripples in the West on the reliability side, and market side too,” he said. “We continue to have conversations as to what this means to Mountain West going forward.”

SPP’s Strategic Planning and Corporate Governance committees have been meeting with Mountain West representatives behind closed doors since October. Monroe assured members they would have a chance to add their input to any protocol and Tariff changes as they bubble up through the RTO’s normal stakeholder process.

SPP working groups will handle the Tariff changes, while the CGC will be responsible for the governance changes. Monroe said financial obligations won’t be discussed until both parties “are comfortable with the policy level.”