By Amanda Durish Cook

The Organization of MISO States (OMS) on Monday voted to lodge a protest in an ongoing dispute over whether states can prohibit energy efficiency resources from entering RTO markets.

OMS Executive Director Tanya Paslawski said the protest asks FERC to apply the same treatment to EE resources as it did to demand response in Order 719. It also affirms the authority of states to have final say in the matter.

The protest filing was approved by the OMS Board of Directors at a July 17 meeting held during the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners Summer Policy Summit in San Diego.

FERC Order 719 required RTOs to accept bids from DR resources for certain ancillary services “on a basis comparable to other resources” and allowed aggregators to bid DR on behalf of retail customers directly into the market under certain circumstances.

OMS’s request stems from a recent disagreement between PJM and the Kentucky Public Service Commission. Citing the need to prevent expensive and unnecessary capacity purchases, the commission issued an order restricting EE resources from participating in PJM wholesale markets except in special cases. PJM staff responded by producing a problem statement contesting state regulators’ authority to restrict EE participation its capacity market. (See “EE Problem Statement Narrowly Approved,” PJM Market Implementation Committee Briefs.) National trade group Advanced Energy Economy petitioned FERC in June for a declaratory order, asking the commission to assert jurisdiction over the terms of EE participation in RTO/ISO markets (EL17-75).

Paslawski said that while FERC expressly left EE resources out of the order, OMS supports their market participation.

OMS members at the San Diego meeting agreed with the filing’s tone to uphold state jurisdiction. Commissioner Ken Anderson said the filing’s “thrust” on the jurisdiction of states was fitting.

MISO Asks OMS for DER Ideas

MISO Executive Director of Market Design Jeff Bladen appeared at the OMS meeting to inform state regulators that the RTO is beginning to work on developing market rules for distributed energy resources — and that he’d like input from the organization.

“Like all emerging issues, this is very much a work in progress,” Bladen said.

MISO seeks to create a common definition for DERs, rather than defining resources by technology type, the first step to developing future policy and planning processes, Bladen said. The RTO is currently running simulations with increased concentrations of DERs in hypothetical conditions to determine how it can create a more coordinated grid in which DERs do not stress transmission operations and real-time reliability conditions.

“We’re trying to test scenarios to see if we’re on the right track,” Bladen said.

Michigan Public Service Commission Chair Sally Talberg asked if MISO could carry out such simulations without communicating with generation owners.

“We’re essentially ignoring the method of dispatch” at this point in our studies, Bladen said.

Stakeholders will again take up DERs as their “hot topic” discussion item at MISO’s next full board meeting in September. Bladen said MISO will ask for stakeholder ideas on how to best integrate the resources.

“We see ourselves as just another collaborator on this rather than giving the answers.”