MISO is off the hook for having to conduct annual cost-benefit analyses of its major transmission projects, FERC has ruled.
FERC on Friday allowed MISO to cut the portion of its Tariff requiring it to conduct annual benefit reviews of its long-term transmission projects. The RTO still will conduct its more comprehensive triennial reviews (ER23-2478). The commission’s approval was effective Sept. 24.
FERC said it was persuaded the annual reviews “have become less useful over the years given the development of alternative sources of similar information.” The commission said it didn’t think the discontinuation of the reviews would affect project transparency in MISO.
In July, MISO proposed eliminating the four limited annual reviews required of it for long-term transmission projects. That will leave the RTO conducting two triennial reviews of projects following project approval. It said the move will “drive administrative efficiency for MISO, its stakeholders and regulators.”
According to MISO, removing the limited reviews will allow it to spend more time planning portfolios of other long-range transmission projects. It also said the annual reviews usually only uncover “minimal data changes” year-over-year and said info on transmission projects’ progress is available to stakeholders on its website, through its Transmission Expansion Plan (MTEP) quarterly status updates and contained in its variance analyses. MISO performs variance analyses on projects only when they materially change in cost, schedule or design from MISO approval.
MISO’s triennial review requires it to calculate economic benefits of major projects, such as congestion and savings and the ability for the RTO to carry a smaller amount of reserves. It also requires MISO to evaluate achieved public policy targets, like the amount of new renewable energy the line can bring to the system, and perform five-year historical examination of the line’s effect on the fleet mix, interconnection trends, energy prices, fuel costs and margin requirements.
On the other hand, the limited reviews required MISO to calculate the latest data available of the economic benefits and five-year historical trends.
The Organization of MISO States supported the pruning of reviews, saying its remaining reporting requirements are sufficient to stay up to date on transmission projects. However, the group of state regulators requested FERC order MISO to “consistently and accurately” update its long-range project dashboard and quarterly status reports on its MTEP portfolios to ensure they’re useful. OMS said MISO has been inconsistent in updating actual project costs and in-service dates, which limits regulators’ ability to question transmission developers’ cost containment efforts.
FERC, however, said the OMS concerns were beyond the scope of the proceeding and declined to address them. MISO said FERC should disregard the OMS request because it’s already working to upgrade its admittedly outdated MTEP project portal, the database it maintains for approved projects.
