By Tom Kleckner

SPP, Associated Electric Cooperative Inc. (AECI) and their stakeholders Friday unanimously endorsed the scope for the entities’ biennial joint system planning study.

The SPP-AECI Interregional Stakeholder Advisory Committee (IPSAC) reviewed and discussed changes to the scope document, which was first unveiled in April. (See “SPP, AECI Begin Biennial Joint-Study Process,” SPP Briefs: State of the Market, Study w/ AECI.)

SPP and AECI will focus their efforts on “pre-determined problem areas” in Oklahoma and Missouri. Those areas include Northeast Oklahoma, where SPP’s 2016 Integrated Transmission Plan Near-Term assessment identified voltage and thermal violations, and the Brookline area west of Springfield, Mo.

SPP’s interregional coordinator, Adam Bell, said the RTO’s regional studies have resulted in projects that could fix the problems in Oklahoma but that the joint study would determine whether interregional transmission projects would be more efficient “than what we or Associated would have done on [our] own.”

Staff revised the scope to add language addressing overloads in the Brookline area when there is little or no hydropower available, generally in the morning or early afternoon hours.

Staff from City Utilities of Springfield said they felt the addition met their needs but that “there are more discussions to be had.”

SPP and AECI staff will now develop system models and begin evaluating the targeted areas in September. The IPSAC will next meet in October, with a final report to be delivered in January.

“We’re not holding ourselves to that schedule,” Bell said. “If we can work faster, we will.”

The two entities have been performing joint studies every other year since 2010, as outlined in their joint operating agreement. The 2014 study identified 463 potential needs along the SPP-AECI seam, but it resulted in no joint solutions.

AECI, based in Springfield, Mo., is owned by and provides wholesale power to six regional generation and transmission cooperatives.