CARMEL, Ind. — The MISO Advisory Committee is attempting to resuscitate a yearslong discussion on whether the RTO should crack down on generators that fail to follow dispatch instructions.
Although the committee did not ultimately decide whether to ask for a proposal during the April 26 conference call, it planned for more discussion on the topic at its May 4 call.
Multiple stakeholders asked MISO to convene a workshop on the uninstructed deviations issue to discuss the RTO’s analysis and what its proposal will look like.
Chair Audrey Penner said the issue has repeatedly fallen on and off the committee’s work plan. “It seems like no one is working quite together on this issue,” Penner said. She asked stakeholders if they want action from MISO, if they think the issue needs to be dropped or if the issue would solve itself with the introduction of five-minute settlements.
“I think MISO wants to hear more clearly from stakeholders on what they want,” Penner added. She asked sectors to provide suggestions on the issue to the Market Subcommittee, where discussion will take place.
MSC Chair Kent Feliks, who noted that narrowing uninstructed deviations “has been discussed for years in pretty good detail in the Market Subcommittee,” said input from AC sectors would be helpful.
The issue has earned “medium” priority on MISO’s Market Roadmap list of market improvements — with a goal last October for a formula change and tighter bands by the end of 2017 — but the project has been at a standstill for a year.
John Weissenborn, MISO’s director of market services, said the delay can be chalked up to RTO staff working on other, more pressing priorities. He said MISO will run a study using historical data that could provide generators guidance on whether their current ramp rate would pass muster under tighter bandwidths.
“I think there has been a lack of coalescing around the issue,” Weissenborn told stakeholders. “It is an important issue, and there is a reliability issue with these dragging megawatts.” He added that aligning the dispatch signal with five-minute settlements is a “very good step” but wouldn’t eliminate the issue of generators receiving make-whole payments despite not responding to dispatch instructions.
The Independent Market Monitor has repeated concerns over the last five years that slow-ramping resources have too much flexibility to deviate from dispatch instructions, with bandwidths so generous that generators can ignore dispatch signals and still profit using the day-ahead margin assistance payment. (See Monitor Again Criticizes MISO’s Uninstructed Deviation Rules.) “Generators can essentially ignore dispatch signals and not be penalized under MISO’s rules,” the committee summarized.
Currently, MISO flags generators if they deviate more than 8% from dispatch instructions for four consecutive five-minute intervals. Monitor David Patton has recommended MISO move to a system based on ramp rate. The threshold for failure to follow dispatch would be set at 2.5 minutes, or half of the unit’s offered ramp capability, capped at 10% of the dispatch level to limit gaming. Units that do not respond to instructions after 20 minutes would be flagged and potentially disqualified from receiving real-time offer revenue sufficiency guarantee payments or day-ahead margin assistance payments.
Organized Feedback Process Ask Crops up at AC Strategic Retreat
Stakeholders from the AC again called attention to what they called MISO’s inconsistent process for gathering and sharing stakeholder feedback.
The topic was brought up in closed meetings at a committee strategic retreat, held in early April in Montreal.
MISO’s stakeholder relations team, committee liaisons and stakeholders are currently working on a more transparent and formal process on how the RTO accepts and shares stakeholder feedback, Penner reported at the April 26 AC meeting.
Stakeholders have said repeatedly that MISO needs to have a more formal and transparent process on how it collects and when it publicly shares feedback. (See MISO Takes Stakeholders’ Temperature on Redesign.)
Currently, it’s up to MISO discretion on what feedback is shared, although the RTO does allow stakeholders to indicate which feedback should be considered confidential. At times, MISO summarizes comments without attributing companies; in other situations, the RTO shares verbatim excerpts and reveals the source. Requests for stakeholder feedback and the summarized or truncated feedback itself is usually shared on meeting presentations.
Some committee members have suggested staggering meetings so companies have more time to submit feedback and no longer juggle simultaneous feedback deadlines. MISO usually allows about two weeks for stakeholders to draft and organize comments on proposals. While discussing improvements to its feedback process, the committee is also soliciting presentation ideas for the next two Board of Directors meetings.
‘Day in the Life of a Megawatt’
During the annual stakeholder meeting in Branson, Mo., in June, MISO stakeholders will not conduct a usual hot topic discussion, Penner said. Instead, each of MISO’s nine sectors will make a short presentation to the board.
NRG Energy’s Tia Elliott suggested that the MISO sectors share “A Day in the Life of a Megawatt” theme, with each sector explaining their piece of the energy lifecycle. Penner asked for ideas on what sector representatives might want to present.
The usual hot topic discussion format will resume at the September board meeting in St. Paul, Minn., and AC leadership wants discussion ideas. Those wishing to submit a topic for consideration must fill out a request form.
MISO Executive Director of External Affairs Kari Bennett said state regulators have mentioned discussing distributed energy resources. Adam McKinnie, chief utility economist for the Missouri Public Service Commission, affirmed that his commission would be interested in discussing how DERs are used and how it might be tracked.
“I think it would be an interesting topic to handle,” McKinnie said.
WEC Energy Group’s Chris Plante also suggested that each sector could discuss its version of a top-three goals for MISO before the board, possibly using past and present recommendations in the Monitor’s State of the Market Reports for inspiration.
Sector Vote Redo Breaks Nominating Committee Tie
The previous tie among two stakeholders to serve on MISO’s Nominating Committee has been broken, with Entergy’s Matt Brown beating out Madison Gas and Electric’s Megan Wisersky.
The other stakeholder seat will be held by Arkansas Public Service Commission Chairman Ted Thomas. (See “Committee Could Lengthen Board Member’s Tenure,” MISO Board of Directors Briefs.) The vote for the second stakeholder seat originally ended in a tie among MISO’s seven voting sectors. In addition to the two stakeholders appointed by the AC, the committee consists of three board members.
“There will be regular updates from the Nominating Committee throughout 2017,” Bennett said. The terms of Directors Thomas Rainwater, Paul Bonavia and Baljit Dail expire at the end of the year. Rainwater and Bonavia have not reached MISO’s limit of three three-year terms and both will seek re-election. With five first-time directors added since 2015, veteran board member Dail ― who has reached the term limit ― has agreed to seek re-election for an additional three-year term if the Nominating Committee deems that a waiver is appropriate and the rest of the board agrees.
— Amanda Durish Cook
