By Tom Kleckner

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — SPP and MISO’s Interregional Planning Stakeholder Advisory Committee met last week to discuss how to improve a process that failed to recommend any interregional projects during its first go-round in 2015.

As required by the RTOs’ joint operating agreement, the IPSAC’s March 9 annual issues review meeting was intended to determine whether a joint study should be performed this year and, if so, what should be in the study’s scope.

Though stakeholders expressed an appetite for another study, they will first provide written feedback to the IPSAC. The committee will then provide a study recommendation to the RTOs’ Joint Planning Committee, which will vote to determine whether a coordinated system plan (CSP) study should begin this year and which transmission issues should be studied.

The JPC — comprising David Kelley, SPP’s director of interregional relations, and MISO’s Eric Thoms, manager of planning coordination and strategy — will be given 45 days to vote after receiving the recommendation.

“When we designed the process, we didn’t want a joint-study process that drags on and on,” said Brett Hooton, SPP’s senior interregional coordinator, in explaining the 45-day timeframe.

‘Triple Hurdle’

Stakeholders will provide comments on the CSP process’ suggested improvements and issues, which included overburdened flowgates, market-to-market congestion, carbon-constrained futures, the MISO North-South flows and what American Electric Power’s Kip Fox “affectionately” refers to as the “triple hurdle” approval process for interregional projects.

“To get through the regional process, a project has to get through three models, three different sets of criteria,” said Fox, AEP’s director of transmission strategy and grid development. “That makes it very difficult to build across the seam.”

The JOA currently requires interregional projects to be agreed upon by both RTOs, improve congestion by at least 5% on either side of the seam and be approved through the respective regional reviews. SPP approval requires a 1.0 benefit-to-cost ratio, while MISO approval requires a 1.25 B/C ratio and limits projects to 345 kV or above.

The first joint study evaluated 67 potential transmission projects and identified three congestion-relieving upgrades, but it was unable to move forward with any of the three. (See SPP, MISO Conclude Joint Study Empty-Handed.)

Several stakeholders said they favored a more targeted study to analyze specific topics instead of another comprehensive process. “We don’t want to see another comprehensive study. Great information, but not very helpful,” said George Dawe, vice president for Duke American Transmission Co.

“We identified three projects and none of them had steel put in the ground,” Fox said. He offered two options to eliminate the triple hurdle: 1) a new interregional project category to allow easier approval and cost allocation, including voltages as low as 100 kV; and 2) adding new benefit metrics following both interregional and regional studies.

“The [adjusted production cost] doesn’t capture all the value of transmission along the seam,” Fox said. His suggested new metrics would include avoided costs, net load payments, and reduced emission rates and operating reserves.

Fox also urged the two RTOs be more flexible with their interregional projects and negotiate solutions beneficial to both sides.

‘Common Sense’

“Let’s use a little common sense,” Fox said. “We want to pay our fair share; you pay your fair share.”

“I think that works when both parties are interested in projects,” responded Jake Langthorn, Oklahoma Gas & Electric’s RTO policy director. “I’m confident SPP wants to do some projects. I don’t have same confidence MISO wants to do any projects.”

MISO bore the brunt of stakeholders’ dissatisfaction with the CSP process. Adam McKinnie, chief utility economist for the Missouri Public Service Commission, said he is “not always impressed” with MISO’s regional studies. Marguerite Wagner, ITC Holdings’ director of SPP RTO policy, said MISO’s 345-kV threshold makes it difficult to fund interregional projects. She noted congested flowgates are constrained by lower-voltage projects.

Davey Lopez, MISO advisor of planning coordination and strategy, discussed a “quick hits” analysis recently conducted with PJM, suggesting a similar process with SPP. However, DATC’s Dawe was skeptical.

“To me, quick hits equals sub-optimal projects,” he said. “I remember quick hits. We got there because we couldn’t do anything through the [PJM] IPSAC.”

A stoic Thoms took much of the criticism in stride. He said MISO “left no stone unturned” in the last joint study, but the cost benefits of the proposed projects “haven’t been there yet.” He said addressing the 345-kV threshold issue is one of MISO’s top priorities.

“I agree finding interregional projects has been elusive,” he said. “MISO sees value in doing coordinated studies and joint evaluation with SPP. We will take all the information here, meet internally, and make that determination as to whether to do another coordinated joint study and what that scope will look like.”

CPP Impacts

DATC’s Bob Burner focused his company’s suggestions on the Clean Power Plan’s impacts and the MISO North/Central-South constraint. Burner said an interregional analysis is needed to better understand the new PROMOD models MISO introduced last year in its Transmission Expansion Planning package.

Wagner likened the SPP-MISO north-south constraint to renting a car, and said transmission expansion could replace MISO’s settlement payments for flows across the seam. “You have these payments, but nothing long-term … no increased flexibility, no increased robustness of the system,” she said. “It’s current money, and you’re going to be paying that into perpetuity instead of for something that might be longer-lasting.”

SPP’s Adam Bell, representing its interregional relations department, reviewed with stakeholders initial feedback gathered by the IPSAC in December following the first study’s conclusion. He said staff reviewed the suggestions it has already received, separating them into process-improvement options, scope-related suggestions and issues to be addressed later.

“We knew this being the first time through the process, we would have significant room for improvement, and that turned out to be true,” Bell said.

Potential improvements include aligning the system plan’s timing with SPP’s Integrated Transmission Process and the MTEP process; aligning the CSP’s models with the RTOs’ regional models; using broader metrics; creating task teams to create more transparency for stakeholders into the process; and providing more information on why projects did not pass screens or were not recommended as interregional projects.

Bell also suggested creating a separate interregional evaluation process to replace SPP’s and MISO’s separate regional review processes and requiring the respective boards of directors to vote up or down on any project recommended by the JPC.

Kelley noted interregional projects have to come through the Order 1000 process. “In lieu of separate regional reviews, we would rely on the results of the interregional evaluations,” he said. “We will still go through three [sets of] approvals but rely on only one review.”

Added Complexity

With the addition of the Integrated System, staff pointed out, the MISO-SPP seam is now approximately 1,200 miles long, and includes more than 60 interconnections, adding to the complexity of determining interregional projects. The concentration of wind energy in the upper Midwest has only exacerbated the situation.

Dan Lenihan, manager of transmission and distribution planning for the Omaha Public Power District, said Nebraska has historically seen heavy north-to-south flows in the summer and a reversal during the winter. “With the large addition of variable energy,” he said, “we’ve seen those north-and-south flows flip on almost a daily basis, depending on how the wind blows.”

“I’m always surprised how this much wind can be added without the transmission to support it,” said Paul Malone, transmission compliance and planning manager with the Nebraska Public Power District. “We’re looking for mitigation on this, or MISO can build some more outlet transmission.”

Xcel Energy asked the RTOs to examine the “very complex” seam along North Dakota. “We would like to determine if any efficiencies in interregional coordination can be found to increase system reliability and provide more cost-effective operational solutions,” said Drew Siebenaler, a transmission and regional planning engineer with Xcel.

Several other stakeholders suggested future studies take into account the growing development of wind energy and other renewables, which are crowding out coal generation.

“Most people acknowledge we’re seeing a shift to lower-carbon generation. I think we missed that in the last study with the [business-as-usual] case,” said the Wind Coalition’s Steve Gaw. “I think it makes sense to make that commitment in the studies going forward. I think it very important, especially considering the seams have increased in distance and we’re involved in a lot more states now.”

Kelley, while welcoming the feedback and asking for more from the stakeholders, pointed out such a study would be the time-consuming, 18-month analysis to which some were objecting.

“If we were to look at a carbon-constrained future, that would be a comprehensive, broad study,” Kelley said. “We could do the exact study we just did, except the [business-as-usual case] would be a carbon-constrained future instead.”

— Amanda Durish Cook contributed to this article.