In a busy meeting Oct. 15, members of NERC’s Standards Committee agreed to move forward with multiple high-priority standards development projects despite disagreements over details of the proposals from ERO staff.

First on the agenda was a standard authorization request (SAR) stemming from FERC Order 909, which in July approved new reliability standards establishing frequency and voltage ride-through requirements for inverter-based resources. (See FERC Approves IBR Ride-through Standards.)

PRC-029-1 (Frequency and voltage ride-through requirements for IBRs) permits owners of legacy IBRs — resources already in operation when the standard goes into effect — 12 months after the effective date of the standard to request an exemption to its ride-through requirements. FERC directed NERC to clarify within 12 months of Order 909:

• • acceptable evidence to demonstrate hardware limitations for legacy IBRs that would prevent them meeting the ride-through requirements; and
  • whether any additional exemptions should be made for HVDC-connected IBRs with choppers — used in offshore wind projects to protect converters during grid faults — and other IBRs with long lead times “between adopting IBR specifications and placing the IBR in service.”

A group of industry stakeholders developed the SAR and submitted it to FERC, NERC Director of Standards Development Jamie Calderon told attendees. Because the project originated from a FERC directive, the ERO has classified it as high priority. NERC asked the committee to authorize posting the SAR for a 30-day formal comment period and soliciting members of the drafting team for the project, which NERC has named Project 2025-05.

Asked by Claudine Fritz of Exelon whether NERC would reconstitute the drafting team for Project 2020-02 (Modifications to PRC-024 — generator ride-through), which developed PRC-029-1, to address Order 909, Calderon said while that team is no longer active, NERC has reached out to its former members to ask if any are interested in being involved.

Jamie Johnson of CAISO then asked if the comment period could be delayed until after a workshop on Order 909 that NERC is planning for Nov. 5. Johnson suggested this pause could “provide more insight for potential revision to the SAR.”

Calderon expressed concern that delaying the start of the project might leave the development team pressed for time. However, in light of the fact that the comment period is expected to start Oct. 29, she suggested extending its length to 45 days. She said this move would allow commenters to consider the issues discussed at the workshop before giving their feedback. Johnson moved to update the proposal with this extension, and committee members approved it unanimously.

Supply Chain, IBR Proposals Pass

Another FERC directive was next on the plate, as the SC took up a SAR addressing the commission’s order Sept. 18 that NERC develop standards addressing supply chain risk management (SCRM) plans by May 21, 2027. (See “Supply Chain Standards Due in 18 Months,” FERC Tackles Cybersecurity in Multiple Orders.)

The new standards must address the sufficiency of entities’ SCRM plans as they relate to identifying and responding to supply chain risks, as well as whether they apply to protected cyber assets (PCAs), defined as “one or more cyber assets connected using a routable protocol within or on an electronic security perimeter [ESP] that is not part of the highest-impact [grid] cyber system within the same” ESP.

NERC asked that attendees approve the SAR’s posting for a 30-day informal comment period and authorize soliciting drafting team members for 15 days. Members voted unanimously to accept a motion to do so.

Also approved without objection was a proposal to appoint the slate of members recommended by NERC for Project 2025-03 (Order 901 operational studies). This project addresses the fourth and final milestone of FERC Order 901 by establishing requirements for registered entities to perform “operational studies for registered IBRs, unregistered IBRs and [distributed IBRs] in the aggregate.”

However, a proposal to approve members for a project addressing Order 901’s requirement for planning studies met with concerns from committee members about the fact that it contained two candidates from the same company. Paul MacDonald, of the New Brunswick Energy and Utilities Board, said that while he was “typically very supportive” of NERC’s recommendations for drafting team composition, he would prefer to see one of the candidates — who were not identified by name during the meeting — removed from the list.

Conferring privately, NERC staff agreed to drop one of the candidates, after which MacDonald moved to approve the updated list. This motion passed unanimously.

The committee’s last standards action was to authorize drafting new or modified standards to allow PCAs, electronic access control or monitoring systems (EACMS) and physical access control systems (PACS) together in a single standard, a move intended to bring clarity to NERC’s enforcement process. SC members previously agreed to post the SAR for this project for a 30-day formal comment period; NERC Manager of Standards Development Alison Oswald said the SAR has been revised in accordance with the comments received through that process.

Finally, SC members voted to endorse NERC’s 2026-2028 Reliability Standards Development Plan (RSDP), which sets out “time frames and anticipated resources for each project under development or anticipated to begin” within the next three years. The RSDP will be presented to NERC’s Board of Trustees in December, and then to FERC for final approval.