The following issues were approved by the Markets and Reliability and Members committees Thursday with little discussion. Each item is listed by agenda number, followed by a summary of the issue and links to prior coverage in RTO Insider.

Markets and Reliability Committee

2. PJM MANUALS

1. Members endorsed manual changes implementing PJM’s revised black start procedures (see FERC Docket ER13-1911). The changes affect M27 Section 7 and M12 Section 4.6.
2. Members endorsed changes to Manual 01: Control Center and Data Exchange Requirements to incorporate updated telemetry and EOP requirements.

3. COORDINATED TRANSACTION SCHEDULING

Members approved a new scheduling product intended to reduce uneconomic power flows between PJM and NYISO.

The Market Implementation Committee on Sept. 11 approved the Coordinated Transaction Scheduling product after amending it to address member concerns about the reliability of PJM’s price projection algorithm — on which CTS trades will be based.

The revised proposal would allow CTS to begin no sooner than September 2014 — later if MRC is not satisfied with the accuracy of the forecasts generated by PJM’s Intermediate Term Security Constrained Economic Dispatch (IT SCED) application.

See New NYISO Product OKd

4. SYNCHRONIZED RESERVE (SR) PERFORMANCE

MRC approved increased penalties for under-performing Tier 2 synchronized reserve providers.

The committee approved a proposal introduced by Dave Pratzon, of GT Power Group, (Package B) after the Operating Committee selected it over a proposal from PJM and the Market Monitor (Package A).

Pratzon said his proposal was tougher than the current penalty but less severe than the PJM-Market Monitor proposal, which he called overly punitive.

The proposal was approved 3.6 to 1.4.

See OC Hears New Proposal on Synchronized Reserve Penalty; Delays Vote

5. CAPACITY CREDIT CALCULATION FOR WIND RESOURCES  

Members approved new rules to protect wind generators from being assigned artificially depressed capacity values due to curtailments ordered by PJM.

Under current policy, when wind generators are curtailed by PJM for any portion of a peak summer hour (2-6 p.m.), the entire hour is excluded from the generator’s capacity calculation.

The MRC selected Alternative 2 under which state estimator data would be used to interpolate output for each five-minute period with curtailments.

See Planning Committee OKs Relief for Wind Generators; MRC Considers Changes to Wind Capacity Calculations

6. EFFICIENCY OF DEMAND RESPONSE REGISTRATION PROCESS 

Members approved two proposals to streamline the demand response registration process.

Current rules require curtailment service providers to submit customer names to both the electric distribution company and load serving entity.

The MRC approved the following changes:

• Emergency Registration: The LSE will be removed from the review and notification process; EDCs will continue to do reviews under “Relevant Electric Retail Regulatory Authority” rules.
• Economic Registration:  The LSE will remain involved but PJM will make administrative changes to simplify the review process. The EDC and LSE review process will be separated to eliminate unnecessary reviews.

The changes are motivated in part by FERC Order 745, which reduced the LSE’s role in the registration process.

See Simplified Demand Response Registration OKd

7. ENERGY MARKET UP-LIFT SENIOR TASK FORCE (EMUSTF) CHARTER 

Members approved the charter for the Energy Market Uplift Senior Task Force (EMUSTF). The MRC approved the creation of the task force in May to take a broad review of its method of providing Operating Reserve payments.

PJM said the changes were needed to reduce growing uplift costs resulting from Operating Reserves, “make whole” payments that ensure generators dispatched out of merit for system reliability don’t operate at a loss.

See PJM Proposes Operating Reserve Changes to Cut Uplift

Members Committee

3. CETL STABILITY– EASILY RESOLVED CONSTRAINTS

Constraints that can be quickly and cheaply resolved would be included in the Regional Transmission Expansion Plan (RTEP) under a proposal approved by the MC.

The new rules require PJM staff to identify — before posting the planning parameters for each Base Residual Auction — Locational Deliverability Areas in which the Capacity Emergency Transfer Limit is less than 1.15 times the Capacity Emergency Transfer Objective.

Upgrades that raise the ratio above 1.15 would be added to the RTEP if they cost less than $5 million and can be completed within 36 months or prior to June 1 of the Delivery Year. Projects that duplicate upgrades whose cost is already assigned to an interconnection customer would be excluded.

See Quick-Fix Transmission Upgrades OKd

4. PARAMETER LIMITED SCHEDULES (PLS) REVISIONS

PJM will add new processes for generators seeking exemptions from operating parameters under Tariff changes endorsed by the MC.

The parameters are defaults for different types and sizes of generators, covering minimum run and down times, maximum daily and weekly starts and turn down ratios (Eco Max/Eco Min). They were initiated in 2008 to ensure lower make whole payments for generators whose entire offers were not covered by Locational Marginal Pricing revenues.

See: MRC Actions