The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Thursday gave final approval to one reliability standard and opened for comment two others.
The commission issued a final rule on the North American Electric Reliability Corp.’s Modeling, Data, and Analysis standard (MOD-028-2; Docket No. RM12-19-000). The rule clarifies the timing and frequency of total transfer capability measurements, which are needed to calculate a transmission provider’s available transfer capability.
In addition, the commission issued Notices of Proposed Rulemaking for two proposed NERC standards: Frequency Response and Frequency Bias Setting (BAL-003-1; Docket No. RM13-11-000) and Protection System Maintenance Reliability Standard (PRC-005-2; Docket No. RM13-7-000), in compliance with directives from FERC Order 693.
Frequency Response
The BAL standard includes requirements for the measurement and provision of frequency response, filling a gap in current standards.
The rule will establish a minimum frequency response obligation for each Balancing Authority, provides a uniform calculation of frequency response, establishes frequency bias settings that establish values closer to actual Balancing Authority frequency response, and encourages coordinated automatic generation control (AGC) operation.
The commission said it will require NERC to submit an analysis of the availability of frequency response resources during the first year of the rule’s implementation. If Balancing Authorities are unable to meet their obligations, NERC will be required to recommend changes to improve compliance.
The commission also said it will require NERC to revise the standard to address concerns over the withdrawal of primary frequency response before activation of secondary frequency response. The premature withdrawal can lead to under-frequency load shedding and possible cascading outages.
Protection System Maintenance
The proposed PRC standard details required maintenance and maintenance schedules for protection systems and load shedding equipment.
It will supersede four existing standards, PRC-005-1.1b (Transmission and Generation Protection System Maintenance and Testing), PRC-008-0 (Underfrequency Load Shedding Equipment Maintenance), PRC-011-0 (Undervoltage Load Shedding Equipment Maintenance) and PRC-017-0 (Special Protection System Maintenance and Testing).
