By Ted Caddell

An increase in demand response, low load growth and market incentives have the nation’s power system in good shape heading into the winter, NERC said in its Winter Reliability Assessment last week.

“NERC-wide, sufficient margins are in place. Most assessment areas experienced little to no load growth, and demand response programs … continue to grow,” Tom Coleman, NERC’s director of reliability assessments, said during a conference call Thursday. “Winter of 2015 posed some challenges, but the system addressed these conditions, learning … from previous years’ lessons.”

“Total internal demand continues to trend downwards and is significantly augmented by the advancement of new energy efficiency programs, distributed energy resources and behind-the-meter generation (BTMG) resources that are being incorporated into planners’ load models and forecasts,” the report said.

While total DR is increasing 2.6 GW to almost 25 GW, NERC reported, resources available in the winter have doubled from about 10 GW to 20 GW.

“The addition of new demand response programs continues to help address potential resource adequacy concerns for areas during their winter peak,” according to the report. “These programs vary greatly in their availability and load reduction capability, but often provide the flexibility needed during extreme conditions.”

The winter-peaking Midwest Reliability Organization-Saskatchewan Power region boosted its winter DR to 244 MW from 158 MW a year ago. PJM, which formerly had only summer DR, has added a year-round product and will have 525 MW available for the winter peak, versus last winter’s 43 MW. (See related story, SPP: Ready for Winter.)

Coleman noted the increased coordination between natural gas suppliers and generators this year is a big improvement over the past two winters, when some generators in ISO-NE and PJM experienced difficulty obtaining gas in times of high demand.

He cited FERC’s approval of New England’s 2015/16 Winter Reliability Program, which established incentives for generators to procure on-site fuel before winter and another program encouraging generators to sign contracts for LNG. A dual-fuel testing and commissioning program will also provide incentives for generators.

NERC also noted readiness improvements in PJM, including pre-winter generator testing and winter preparation checklists as well as better communication on fuel status and improved coordination with natural gas pipelines.

Despite a net loss of 6,163 MW of installed capacity since last winter, NERC said PJM is in good shape, with an anticipated reserve margin of 40%, well above its own 15.6% requirement. (See PJM Prepared for Winter Load, Mild Temps Expected.)

“Because of the nature of the [three-year] forward capacity market in PJM,” NERC said, the benefits of its Capacity Performance rules “will not be seen until the winter of 2016/17.”