SPP’s market-to-market (M2M) process with MISO again resulted in a large payment to SPP for November operations. The SPP Riverton-Neosho-Blackberry flowgate on the Kansas-Missouri border was once again responsible for the bulk of the payment.
Including November’s total of $3.9 million, the permanent flowgate has resulted in $15.3 million of M2M payments to the RTO from MISO, accounting for almost half of the $32.7 million SPP has or will receive since the M2M process began in March 2015.
The flowgate was binding for 296 hours in November after binding for 329 hours in October, when it racked up a $5.1 million charge to MISO. The flowgate is responsible for more M2M payments between the two RTOs than the next seven flowgates combined.
RTO staff told the Seams Steering Committee on Jan. 3 that they are analyzing data to determine what kind of project would address the historical congestion in the area and whether it would be worth forgoing the M2M payments.
“We may be getting $5 million a month from MISO, but how is that impacting load in the area?” SPP’s Will Ragsdale said. “We want to understand the impact on the market as a whole, not just this one piece of data.”
Ragsdale promised to bring results of the analysis to the February meeting.
As was the case in October, loading because of high wind combined with nearby outages produced the constraint. The flowgate is in the Empire District Electric and Westar Energy control zones.
SPP-MISO IPSAC to Meet in February
With no joint study scheduled this year, the SPP-MISO Interregional Planning Stakeholder Advisory Committee (IPSAC) will conduct an annual issues review with stakeholders Feb. 27 in Little Rock, Ark.
SPP Interregional Coordinator Adam Bell told the SSC that the IPSAC will review transmission issues identified by the RTOs or stakeholders, regional expansion plans and regional planning coordination. SPP and MISO have yet to agree on a single interregional project in two attempts.
Bell invited stakeholders to submit transmission issues and feedback on the RTOs’ joint planning by Jan. 29.
“It’s not limited to transmission issues,” Bell said. “We’ll listen to process improvements, lessons learned from joint studies and ideas on future planning.”
Under terms of the RTOs’ joint operating agreement, the IPSAC will meet every year that there is no joint study.
SPP staff will also meet with Associated Electric Cooperative Inc. in the first quarter to review the scope for a 2018 joint study.
SPP Sets New Winter Peak Demand Record
Last week’s frigid temperatures across the nation and in SPP’s footprint resulted in a new winter peak demand for the RTO of 41,014 MW on Jan. 2.
The RTO, with a 14-state footprint that stretches from East Texas to the Dakotas, issued a cold weather alert through Jan. 4. Some of the RTO’s gas units had difficulty procuring fuel and switched to more costly oil, but a spokesman said SPP had not “encountered anything unmanageable.”
— Tom Kleckner
