PJM’s summer 2013 emergency preparedness drill exposed several communications problems and the need for additional training, PJM’s Bill Powell told the Operating Committee Tuesday. Powell identified several issues in his debriefing on the May 14 drill:

• One company was unable to submit correct Supplemental Status Report (SSR) data in the Dispatcher Applications and Reporting Tool (eDART); two companies requested additional training on SSR.
• Several companies complained of garbled satellite phone messages.
• Several companies said that messages on the All Call notification system were too long.
• Several companies identified the need to perform additional internal training or update internal processes.
• PJM did not post the Manual Load Dump event on the Emergency Procedures posting application at the same time as the Manual Load Dump All Call. Several companies requested clarification regarding the time to be used in event of an actual load dump situation; PJM said the All Call time will be used.
• Several inconsistencies were noted in drill sequence and accompanying All Call messages regarding loading max emergency combustion turbines first instead of steam units. All Call drill wording did not match some of Manual 13. Future drill messages will be corrected to match PJM manuals.

PJM contacts: Bill Powell, Dave Turtle
epdrill@pjm.com
610-955-2466