The NEPOOL Participants Committee voted April 4 to support an additional two-year delay of ISO-NE’s Forward Capacity Auction 19 to buy time for the RTO to develop and implement resource capacity accreditation (RCA) changes and shift the overall timeline of capacity auctions.
FCA 19 will procure capacity for the 2028/2029 capacity commitment period (CCP), and initially was scheduled for February 2025. The auction previously was delayed by a year in a filing approved by FERC in early January. (See FERC Approves ISO-NE’s One-Year Delay of FCA 19.) The additional delay would push the auction to February 2028, with the related CCP set to begin in June of that year.
This February, ISO-NE endorsed a major redesign of its forward capacity market. While auctions historically have been held more than three years prior to each yearlong CCP, ISO-NE hopes to adopt a “prompt/seasonal” capacity market, with auctions held just months prior to the CCP, which would be broken up into distinct seasonal periods. (See NEPOOL MC Backs Further Forward Capacity Auction Delay, ISO-NE Moving Forward with Prompt, Seasonal Capacity Market Design.)
Meanwhile, the RTO is continuing work on its RCA updates, which are intended to better align the capacity values assigned to different resources with the actual reliability benefits the resources provide. (See NEPOOL Markets Committee Briefs: March 13, 2024, NEPOOL Markets Committee Briefs: Feb. 6, 2024.)
The vote on the additional delay passed with broad support from the PC, though some stakeholders have expressed concern the delay could hurt the development of new resources that rely on capacity market revenues.
To help mitigate these impacts, ISO-NE will allow new resources expected to be operational by June 2028 but that lack capacity supply obligations to qualify for reconfiguration auctions.
Extended-term/Longer-term Transmission Planning Phase 2
The PC also voted to support a proposal from ISO-NE and the New England States Committee on Electricity (NESCOE) to create a new process for transmission investments to address long-term transmission needs.
The process would allow ISO-NE to issue a request for proposals targeting long-term transmission needs at the direction of the states. ISO-NE then would select a preferred solution out of the proposals received, while giving the states the option to proceed with this preferred solution. (See NEPOOL TC Approves Process for States’ Transmission Needs.)
The costs of selected projects would be regionalized among the states unless NESCOE proposes an alternative cost allocation methodology. For a project to be eligible for selection, expected quantified benefits must outweigh costs.
The PC also passed a supplemental process that would allow the states to select a proposal even if no project passed the cost/benefit threshold. In this supplemental process, one or more states could agree to cover the costs that exceed the benefits, while the rest of the costs would be regionalized.
Operations Updates
ISO-NE COO Vamsi Chadalavada said overall demand in March was lower than historical levels due to mild temperatures and increasing behind-the-meter solar production. The monthly peak load was 15,692 MW, which occurred on the evening of March 21.
Chadalavada noted that ISO-NE expects the eclipse on April 8 to cut solar generation by about 3,600 MW but said the RTO “has simulated this event, and our operators are ready.”
