VALLEY FORGE, Pa. — PJM’s Chris Pilong informed the Operating Committee that the transmission upgrades needed to allow the retirement of Indian River Unit 4 could be complete by the end of the year, potentially allowing the reliability-must-run agreement with the generator to be terminated a year early.
Pilong said rebuilding of the 138-kV Vienna-Nelson line is ahead of schedule and would resolve the transmission violations that led to the RMR contract negotiations with NRG Energy to keep Unit 4 in operation. While the RMR is in effect, the Maryland Office of People’s Counsel and the Independent Market Monitor have protested the compensation included in the contract, which amounts to $263 million between June 2022 and the original RMR end date of Dec. 31, 2026. (See PJM Monitor and Consumers Protest Indian River Compensation Settlement.)
The line rebuilding constituted the largest component of the upgrades PJM identified, with the remainder being substation upgrades that are expected to be completed ahead of the line coming back into service. Pilong said the rebuilding of Vienna-Nelson was complicated by the line needing to be in service during the summer, which limited when it could be taken out of service.
The RMR contract includes a 65-day notification requirement before the agreement can be terminated.
Stakeholders Endorse Revisions to Manual 12 for Black Start Fuel Requirements
The committee endorsed by acclamation revisions to Manual 12: Balancing Operations to include items approved in the package matrix stakeholders approved in 2022, but which were inadvertently not reflected in the corresponding manual revisions. (See Stakeholders Endorse PJM’s Black Start Fuel Reqs Proposal.)
The overall proposal stakeholders endorsed established a new category of “fuel-assured” generators and required at least one such unit to be committed in each transmission zone. The criteria to qualify as a fuel-assured unit vary based on resource type, including connections to multiple interstate gas pipelines, on-site fuel storage and dual-fuel capability. (See “PJM Presents Black Start Manual Revisions,” PJM OC Briefs: June 6, 2024.)
The latest changes include exempting fuel-assured generators from penalties for going under their minimum fuel inventory while responding to a performance assessment interval (PAI) or if the storage was emptied for regulatory inspections. The revisions also remove an existing six-month fuel assurance inventory notification requirement and replace it with language that generators must verify their fuel and consumables inventory upon PJM request and an annual verification requirement on the black start test form.
Security Update
PJM Director of Enterprise Information Security Jim Gluck said the FBI has published a public interest notification for renewable energy developers because of attackers targeting the sector, possibly because of the interest and growth in clean energy.
Recent attacks against automotive dealers have involved impersonations of customer support staff to gain access to sensitive data that was stolen, which Gluck said underscores the need to be cautious when interacting with third parties.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has published new network access security guidelines around protecting networks from intrusion and how to ensure users are interacting with external networks safely.
June Operating Metrics
Interactions between a heat wave with some of the highest peak loads of any June that PJM has experienced and thunderstorms led to high peak load forecast error between June 22 and 25, culminating with actual load being about 7.5% higher on June 25 than the day-ahead forecast.
PJM’s Marcus Smith said the heat wave subsided faster than expected June 25, causing some regions to see temperatures significantly below forecast. The peak and hourly error was above the 25-month average but fell well below the error rates seen in June 2023 and 2022, he said.
The month saw three shared reserve events, two spin events, seven hot weather alerts and one geomagnetic disturbance warning. Three shortage cases were approved June 3 because of a unit tripping.
