VALLEY FORGE, Pa. — Interconnection customers would be required to provide more documentation earlier to ensure consideration of their projects under proposed changes to the queue submittal process.

The recommendations came out of the Earlier Queue Submittal Task Force, which was convened after current rules — which charge nonrefundable fees that escalate later in the queue window — were found to be ineffective in incenting earlier applications. (See “Still Searching for Ways to Incent Early Project Submissions,” PJM Planning Committee Briefs.)

Early on, the task force decided that it would have little luck trying to change human behavior and instead focused on the objective of being able to start building models for the projects, PJM’s Dave Egan said.

The thinking led to a number of proposed changes.

Currently, queue priority is assigned based on the date the application and deposit are submitted, and supporting documentation is not required. Under the new rules, priority would not be secured until all required elements of a project, including site control, were submitted.

PJM would perform a deficiency review only after all the elements, aside from site control, were in hand.

Applications would have to clear their deficiencies by the close of the queue window or be terminated. PJM would codify in the Tariff that it has five business days to review a deficiency response.

Project deposits would become chargeable immediately upon application, and instead of socializing the cost of applications that fail to clear their deficiencies, PJM would charge the customer.

Instead of having a different fee structure for large generation and small generation, the nonrefundable amount would be 10% of the overall fee for all projects, and the refundable portion would be spent by PJM first.

PJM also proposes to move the opening of queue windows to April from May and to October from November as soon as this fall. That will improve the opportunity of generation to participate in the May Base Residual Auction, Egan said.

The Planning Committee will be asked to vote on the changes in May.

Reference Model for CPP Study Introduced

PJM introduced the reference model it will use to study the economic and reliability implications of the Clean Power Plan.

The initial review will look at the next 20 years and provide potential scenarios driven by policy, regulation and the market. (See PJM to Proceed on CPP Study Despite Supreme Court Ruling.)

The study was requested by the Organization of PJM States.

At Thursday’s Transmission Expansion Advisory Committee meeting (TEAC), PJM also presented results of sensitivities conducted on the reference model that assumed state renewable portfolio standards and gas prices averaging $3.43/MMBtu through 2037. (The reference case assumes an average of $5.14/MMBtu.)

Among the key observations, PJM found that high capacity prices will allow natural gas combined cycles to enter the market despite low energy prices, while coal and nuclear resources will increase their dependence on the capacity market to recover their costs.

Wind and solar will be able to grow in a low-gas-price environment as long as renewable portfolio standards are enforced. PJM also predicts that lower gas prices will result in a reduction of carbon emissions through increased retirements of coal plants and the entry of new gas combined cycle plants.

PJM expects to release a final report by the end of May.

Year’s First Proposal Window Draws 26 Projects

The first competitive transmission proposal window of the year drew 26 projects from seven entities.

The projects address generator deliverability, common mode outage violations and end-of-life facilities.

Three are transmission owner upgrades ranging in cost from $7.7 million to $48.5 million. Twenty-three are greenfield projects with cost estimates of $15.6 million to $111.5 million.

More details will be provided at a future TEAC meeting.

PJM collected about $190,000 to study the projects under its new proposal fee structure. (See “Two-tiered Fee Schedule for Order 1000 Projects OK’d,” PJM Markets and Reliability Committee Briefs.)

Proposal Would Exclude TO Upgrades from Order 1000 Window

PJM is proposing to exclude certain transmission owner upgrades from the Order 1000 competitive window process. They include typical short-circuit violations and fixes to substation terminal equipment such as wave traps, current transformers and capacitors.

“We’re looking at situations where the upgrade is only a modest upgrade to equipment inside a substation,” said Steve Herling, PJM vice president of planning. “Our intention is to not have a window for something we know can be easily fixed.”

Few baseline projects driven by short circuits have resulted in a greenfield project, said PJM’s Mark Sims, who plans to present proposed changes on a first read next month at the Planning and Markets and Reliability committees.

– Suzanne Herel