MISO stakeholders last week laid out what they think are the top issues the RTO should tackle in the next year.

A “Top 10” project list emerged after stakeholders ranked 34 market modification proposals in the RTO’s annual Market Roadmap process, MISO Senior Manager of Market Strategy Mia Adams said during an Aug. 10 Market Subcommittee meeting.

Stakeholder scoring results still have to be tallied alongside staff weightings to arrange what market projects the RTO will eventually undertake first.

“This is not a prioritization yet. We’ll come back again this fall with an updated work plan,” Adams said. “However, it does look like [staff and stakeholders] are in pretty good alignment this year, more so than last year.”

This year, MISO limited stakeholders’ scoring to a maximum of four “high” and six “medium” priority designations, with an unlimited number of “low” and “do not pursue” designations. This year’s market project candidates included proposals outlined in the Independent Market Monitor’s annual State of the Market report. (See MISO, Stakeholders Embark on Market Roadmap Rankings.)

Rising to the top of stakeholder priorities: energy storage. Sixty-one market participants with voting rights determined that the most pressing issue for the market is defining a new resource type to accommodate the unique qualities of energy storage. During a special storage workshop last month, stakeholders asked MISO for a storage market definition. (See MISO Rules Must Bend for Storage, Stakeholders Say.)

Three other issues earned high priority from stakeholders:

• Creating an automatic generation control software enhancement that deploys fast-ramping resources more quickly. MISO currently estimates that software can be operational in late 2019;
• Introducing multiday financial commitments (See MISO Exploring Multiday Market.); and
• Better modeling of MISO’s approximate 40 combined cycle generators worth 29 GW, which was first requested by market participants in 2011 and is currently in a benefit analysis and design option phase. The new modeling could save an annual $14 million to $34 million in production costs, according to MISO’s Yonghong Chen, but won’t be ready until 2020.

Market improvements recommended by Monitor David Patton took four of the six medium-priority designations in final stakeholder scoring:

• Setting up short-term capacity pricing and reliability standards so energy can be provided within 30 minutes when needed to manage capacity needs;
• Factoring seasonal needs and risks into the capacity auction;
• Refining modeling and rules so demand response and storage resources “operating across multiple buses” can aggregate to meet a minimum megawatt participation limit;
• Expanding conditions and temperature-adjusted transmission ratings into MISO’s Energy Management System;
• Creating a virtual spread product; and
• Incentivizing frequency response service.

MISO will release its final Market Roadmap by December.

Five-Minute Settlements Delayed?

Several stakeholders have asked MISO to consider pushing back the March 1, 2018, target for implementing the five-minute settlements calculation. (See “Five-Minute Settlements BPM due in Summer,” MISO Market Subcommittee Briefs.)

Northern Indiana Public Service Co.’s Bill SeDoris said his company is still awaiting Business Practices Manual language while it works to implement five-minute settlements, and could miss the deadline while still making software and mechanical adjustments. DTE Energy’s Nick Griffin agreed.

“We are hearing from folks the same concern,” said MISO Executive Director of Market Design Jeff Bladen. “We are still subject to a FERC order. … We can ask for an extension, but we have a FERC order that we have to comply with. That said, we can only do what everyone is feasibly capable of.”

Bladen said MISO has already requested a later implementation date than other RTOs, but it will further discuss the possibility of an extension during the September Market Subcommittee meeting. He said MISO still has a team working to create five-minute settlements rules, but the work, originally due in early summer, has been delayed. It is also working on identifying units that habitually deviate from setpoint instructions, he said.

Mississippi Trading Hub

MISO has used geometric analysis to identify 159 electrical pricing node candidates to comprise Mississippi’s own commercial trading hub, said Michael Robinson, principal adviser of market design.

The nodes are located in both the MISO South and Southern Mississippi Electric Power Association territories, Robinson said. All other MISO trading hubs contain at least 100 electric pricing nodes, and the RTO’s analysis considered 622 possible nodes.

The proposed hub, the first MISO hub in the state, will be rigorously stress-tested over the next two months before final recommendation is made at the October MSC meeting, Robinson said. The RTO hopes the new hub will go live before the end of the year. (See MISO Examines Potential Mississippi Trading Hub.)

Market Reopen Incident

Stakeholders also asked why MISO had to briefly reopen its day-ahead market after market close on July 26.

MISO Executive Director of Strategy Shawn McFarlane called the reopening a “market participant issue.”

“To not correct this issue would have caused all other sorts of issues in the market,” McFarlane said, adding that the error fell into the “broad category” of data-entry errors. He declined to provide any other details.

Tariff changes made last year enable MISO to extend or reopen the day-ahead market to address technical problems. (See “Day-Ahead Market Extension to be Written into Tariff,” MISO Market Subcommittee Briefs.) Stakeholders asked MISO officials for a future presentation describing under what scenarios MISO may reopen the market. Bladen said MISO could put together a presentation for the September MSC meeting.

— Amanda Durish Cook