By Christen Smith

VALLEY FORGE, Pa. — PJM’s Members Committee will vote on rule changes this week that would give stakeholders more time to review governing document revisions.

The package — part of a larger review of the RTO’s stakeholder process — would require PJM to post proposed changes online at least seven business days prior to a scheduled vote at the Markets and Reliability Committee. When possible, the RTO would also schedule “page turn” meetings during which members may propose revisions. Stakeholders would then be required to provide their feedback on the changes to PJM no later than three days before the scheduled vote.

Rebecca Carroll, PJM’s director of member relations, said the changes were developed during seven special sessions of the Stakeholder Process Super Forum that convened between January and July.

Transparency

The new posting timeline comes after months of procedural skirmishes over whether specific revisions, amendments, problem statements and issue charges should have been disseminated to stakeholders sooner.

In some cases, PJM posted contentious revisions online just hours before a scheduled vote before a standing committee, frustrating stakeholders. In other instances, stakeholders warily endorsed problem statements and issue charges on a first read.

The new language proposed for Manual 34 would not only mandate a specific timeline but also build in additional avenues for feedback in the event that revisions change between an MRC vote and a FERC filing. In that case, PJM would post the changes online three business days before a planned filing and set up a dedicated email for receiving feedback from members.

Priority of Issues

Another package up for vote would set priorities to manage the number of issues under consideration and the number of meetings — an area honed in on when polled last year. (See Poll: Stakeholder Process Imperfect, Necessary.)

Under this proposal, PJM would condense and organize meetings so that similar subjects are tackled on the same day. Meetings scheduled for less than two hours would be WebEx only. The RTO would also honor two contiguous “no-meeting days” once a month and recognize major religious and national holidays.

Other proposed changes include:

• “Meeting prioritization” decisions would be made by the secretary of the MC.
• Subcommittee meetings may be scheduled one year in advance and may be shortened and consolidated when possible.
• Task forces, special sessions, etc., would be permitted to be scheduled only six months in advance to more accurately reflect their meeting need and duration.
• Stakeholders would be required to review the current committee work plan prior to the approval of a new issue charge.

Critical Issue Fast Path

The Super Forum also proposed creating a new section in Manual 34 that details a critical issue fast path (CIFP) that would give members “an orderly and facilitated process for contentious issues with known PJM and/or FERC implementation that were not resolved, or would be extremely difficult to resolve, within the normal stakeholder process.”

PJM said the process would only be reserved for select issues and only be initiated by the Board of Managers. The board could trigger the process over a time-sensitive issue that has yet to be resolved through the typical work schedule, or members could request the board to initiate the process with a two-thirds majority vote at the MC.

The CIFP would take priority over other scheduled meetings and could require multiday meetings to meet deadlines. The process could take as little as five days up to a few months, PJM said.

After concluding the CIFP, the MC would conduct a sector-weighted vote on the packages. If any package receives greater than two-third support, PJM would file it under Section 205 of the Federal Power Act at FERC. In the event of multiple packages meeting the majority threshold, the package with the highest amount of support would advance to the filing stage.

Next Steps

All three proposals received more than 90% stakeholder support at the last Super Forum meeting, Carroll said. The MC will vote the packages on Thursday, with implementation scheduled for next year.