By Rory D. Sweeney

WILMINGTON, Del. — An informational update on PJM’s Transmission Replacement Processes Senior Task Force at the end of the Markets and Reliability Committee meeting last week turned into a hotly contested debate and impromptu vote.

The result was that the task force is still on target to resume on July 28. It has been on hiatus since an MRC vote in September, about a month after PJM and Transmission Owners received an order to show cause from FERC to determine whether the TOs are complying with their local transmission planning obligations for supplemental projects under Order 890. The hiatus, requested to focus on responding to the show cause order, was extended until July at the February MRC. (See FERC Orders PJM TOs to Change Rules on Supplemental Projects.)

In his presentation, PJM’s Fran Barrett noted the “predominate desire” of TOs to continue the suspension of the task force and transmission customers’ “uniform desire” to lift resume task force meetings.

The TOs filed their initial response to the show cause order on Oct. 25 and followed up with responses to comments on its filing a month later. The TOs insisted their Operating Agreement already complies with Order 890 but proposed a Tariff amendment providing additional detail regarding the process for planning supplemental projects (EL16-71).

FERC assured the order would be finalized by January, according to Barrett. But the commission didn’t rule on the TOs’ response before losing its quorum in February.

“We’re locked in the horns of an MRC-directed process versus a FERC-directed process, and we’re looking for guidance for how to take that forward,” he said.

Chris O’Hara, PJM deputy general counsel, stressed that the RTO doesn’t have approval authority over TO supplemental projects. “PJM is ready to engage on these topics. However, that engagement might be more productive after FERC takes action on” the situation, he said.

Representatives of several TOs — including Public Service Enterprise Group’s Alex Stern, PPL’s Frank “Chip” Richardson, Exelon’s Gloria Godson and Duquesne Light’s Tonja Wicks — all advised that they would attend task force meetings once the hiatus has ended, but they likely will not be able to make many decisions until the FERC action is resolved. The circumstances that precipitated suspending the task force in the first place haven’t changed, they said.

Godson motioned to continue the hiatus, and Stern offered a friendly amendment to extend it until FERC rules on the issue and reconsider options if nothing has changed by December. “I don’t think our attorneys would sanction our involvement under a show cause order,” Stern said.

Carl Johnson of the PJM Public Power Coalition said he appreciated the “intellectual honesty,” but that he would oppose the motion because there are other issues on which the task force could be productive. Susan Bruce, representing the PJM Industrial Customer Coalition, and American Municipal Power’s Lisa McAlister also opposed the proposal.

“AMP thinks there’s valuable work to be done [before] a FERC order,” McAlister said. “We’re getting a piecemeal change process that’s the result of, frankly, AMP being a very squeaky wheel. … We don’t think that’s the best procedural way for making these changes.”

American Electric Power’s Dana Horton said there are plenty of other issues to focus on at PJM that aren’t under the auspices of a show-cause order. He supported extending the hiatus so stakeholders don’t have to waste time on unproductive discussions. “We don’t want to expend resources to just look at each other,” he said.

The motion to extend the hiatus failed with 1.79 in favor in a sector-weighted vote that had a 3.335 threshold for passage.