Committee Approves Task Force to Address Crypto Mining Loads

ERCOT’s Technical Advisory Committee last week approved staff’s request to create a task force to develop policy recommendations for interconnecting large flexible loads, such as cryptocurrency miners that are flocking to the state.

ERCOT has already established an interim process, effective March 25, requiring transmission service providers (TSPs) to submit interconnection studies for large loads that have not been modeled and studied in a completed staff planning assessment and proposing to interconnect to the grid.

The interim process applies to those projects that add 20 MW of demand at a generator within the next two years. Projects that aren’t co-located face a minimum threshold of 75 MW. The rule applies to both new projects and expansions.

The committee debated the Large Flexible Load Task Force’s proposed scope and how deep into the policy weeds its members should get before agreeing to let the group further refine its scope and bring it back before TAC for its April 13 meeting.

“We really need to figure out the reliability issues around these cryptos,” said Bob Wittmeyer, representing Longhorn Power. “Adding things beyond our authority is going to slow down the work of the group.”

“We just want to get this rolling as soon as possible. We’re concerned about how quickly these loads are coming on,” said Woody Rickerson, ERCOT’s vice president of system planning and weatherization. “We have processes to interconnect large loads; that isn’t the issue. It’s this new type of load that’s coming on very quickly that we don’t have the process for.”

The task force will report directly and provide recommendations to the TAC. Staff will lead the group, which will nominate a vice chair for the committee’s approval during its first meeting.

RUC Offer Floor Lowered to $250

TAC members took three separate votes before finally reaching consensus on the Independent Market Monitor’s proposal to lower the reliability unit commitment’s (RUC) offer floor from $1,500/MWh to $250/MWh.

The committee narrowly rejected a proposal to lower the floor to $200/MWh, 17-9 with four abstentions. However, had one of those abstentions been a “yes” vote, it would have passed. A vote to lower the floor to $500/MWh was more soundly defeated, 14-12 with four abstentions, before the $250/MWh compromise passed, 18-8 with four abstentions.

The investor-owned utility segment accounted for 11 of the 12 abstentions, with American Electric Power’s Richard Ross casting a “yes” vote during the final attempt.

The nodal protocol revision request (NPRR1092) also includes a two-hour opt-out provision.

ERCOT established the RUC offer floor when the market construct’s self-commitment was relied upon and RUCs were infrequent. That changed last year with the grid operator’s conservative operations, when it began procuring more reserves to ensure greater grid reliability.

Reliant Energy Retail Services’ Bill Barnes helped hammer out the compromise with Luminant Energy, one of the more vocal opponents to ERCOT’s increased use of RUCs. “We think this addresses concerns about being able to opt-out at the last minute,” he said.

“We’re concerned about out-of-market actions affecting us. We’re not sure whether to start in quick-start mode right now,” Luminant’s Ian Haley said.

Staff still need to provide an impact analysis for the change and committed to do so before the TAC’s meeting this month.

ECRS Resources Face 2-hour Requirement

The committee passed a rule change that requires resources providing ERCOT contingency reserve service (ECRS) to provide two consecutive hours and/or be capable of sustaining four consecutive hours of non-spinning reserve service. The TAC approved NPRR1096 by a 20-3 vote, with seven members abstaining.

Jupiter Power’s Caitlin Smith, who cast one of the opposing votes, filed comments that argued the measure would require a longer duration for an existing service currently awarded on an hourly basis and result in a policy that is not technology neutral. Smith also said the change would narrow the pool of non-spin suppliers and further distorts the market.

“This does seem to be overly cautious and can affect the market by keeping some folks from providing the service,” Sierra Club’s Cyrus Reed said.

The TAC agreed to an action item to review long-duration resources’ solutions that require ERCOT system changes to manage reliability risk related to the provision of ancillary services.

Jupiter recently commercialized its first transmission-connected project, a 100-MW storage facility in West Texas with 200 MWh of duration capacity.

NPRR1096 also requires ERCOT to conduct unannounced tests on energy storage resources providing ECRS and/or non-spin in real time to verify their state of charge.

Helton Replaces Blakey as Vice Chair

Committee members elected Engie’s Bob Helton, a former TAC chair, to replace Just Energy’s Eric Blakey as vice chair.

Blakey, who served as TAC’s vice chair last year, withdrew his nomination for 2022 when ERCOT’s Board of Directors last month declined to confirm his election and that of South Texas Electric Cooperative’s Clif Lange as chair. The board deferred their approval following an executive session. (See ERCOT Board of Directors Briefs: March 7-8, 2022.)

Blakey told members it was his understanding that the directors were uncomfortable confirming him after Just Energy filed a lawsuit in November against ERCOT and the Texas Public Utility Commission. The Canada-based retailer, which filed for bankruptcy after the February 2021 winter storm, is seeking to recover payments that were made by its parties to the grid operator for certain invoices relating to the storm.

Interim ERCOT CEO Brad Jones all but confirmed Blakey’s comments, telling the committee that the directors “had a discomfort because of the relationship with his company.”

“All of the board sees you as a man of high integrity,” Jones told Blakey. “This issue had nothing to do with yourself; it has everything to do with the situation in which we find ourselves.”

“I respect the decision,” said Blakey, who said he intends to remain a TAC member. “Being vice chair is something I’ll always cherish. It’s been an honor.”

Blakey nominated Helton, who served as TAC chair until 2021, as his replacement. Helton was elected without opposition.

“I’ll be glad to help out for the rest of this year,” Helton said, thanking Blakey for his service.

Engie last week filed its own complaint against ERCOT with the PUC, alleging it had not been compensated or credited for ancillary services provided during the emergency alert conditions wrought by the 2021 storm. Jones noted Engie is following ERCOT’s alternative dispute resolution process, which allows an appeal before the commission should its initial complaint be rejected.

The board will have a chance to confirm Lange’s and Helton’s elections during this month’s meeting.

In-person Meetings Return

The meeting was the TAC’s first in person since the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020 and its first at ERCOT’s new headquarters offices in Austin, as its members acknowledged.

Lange, presiding over his first in-person meeting as the committee’s chair, introduced himself as “the man behind the curtain for the last few years.”

Barnes, sporting a new horseshoe mustache more commonly known as a handlebar, approved the previous meeting’s minutes by raising his nameplate.

“I’m just making sure my card still works,” he cracked.

TAC Endorses 5 Changes

The TAC approved a system change request against three votes from the consumer segment. SCR818 modifies the network model management system and topology processor to incorporate geomagnetically induced currents (GIC) modeling data for maintaining GIC system models in the ERCOT planning area for compliance with NERC reliability standard TPL-007-4 (Transmission System Planned Performance for Geomagnetic Disturbance Events).

Members unanimously approved a combination ballot that included four additional NPRRs:

• • NPRR1116: removes obsolete language from Market Information System Administrative and Design Requirements referencing other binding documents on the system. Those documents are posted to the ERCOT website.
  • NPRR1117: aligns the protocols with SMOGRR025’s revisions allowing losses in short runs of connecting lines to be disregarded where the ERCOT-polled settlement meter is not physically at the point of interconnection.
  • NPRR1122: clarifies that ERCOT will retain all securitization default charge escrow deposits to cover necessary potential future obligations for securitization default charges, and that funds provided for default charge escrow deposits must be sent to the correct account to be properly credited. It also corrects a subscript definition error in the securitization default charge maximum megawatt-hour activity ratio share.
  • NPRR1123: provides for the assessment of securitization uplift charge escrow deposits based on counter-party initial estimated adjusted meter load.