MISO Reliability Subcommittee Briefs

System Operation Training Working Group May Become a MISO User Group

Feb 14, 2016

The MISO Reliability Subcommittee discussed its priorities for 2016 and the System Operation Training Working Group.

MISO’s System Operation Training Working Group (SOTWG) is at risk of disbanding after a request for new leadership went unanswered. The working group has lacked a chairperson since former chair Steve Zimmerman stepped down at the end of December.

“It looks like if we’re not going to get any stakeholder volunteers for leadership, this might be an opportunity … to move this into a MISO user group,” Reliability Subcommittee Chair Tony Jankowski said during a Feb. 10 meeting. Although user groups don’t participate in policy decisions, he said the RSC would still provide a forum for stakeholders on training operations should the change be made.

“If we move to the user group, it would be temporary, for me at least, and if we get way off-track or out-of-kilter, we may have to move it back to more stakeholder-driven than a user group. It isn’t going to happen overnight, but truly this is a call-out,” Jankowski said. “There’s a lot of groups and organizations that attend these meetings. Stakeholder leadership, even at a working-group level, is a valuable thing. We’re just short of that stakeholder participation, and we need to have that.”

He added that the leadership vacancy should be reported to MISO’s Steering Committee, which could order the change. He didn’t put a timeline on it but urged participants to come forward with nominations before that happens.

The working group is charged with identifying and meeting MISO stakeholder training needs. Last year, it worked with MISO to publish an online training catalog, developed training sessions on natural gas coordination and made NERC continuing education classes available. The SOTWG said it trained 2,015 people and provided about 384 hours of continuing education in 2015.

SOTWG Vice Chair Will Behnke said participation was low during 2015 training sessions, with people signing up for courses and often failing to attend. He reminded the subcommittee that the courses are provided free of charge.

“I really strongly recommend that folks send someone out to attend these meetings,” Behnke said.

2016 Priorities

Jankowski outlined issues the RSC plans to address in 2016.

He said the RSC began asking stakeholders to compile a list of reliability issues in January and identified frequency response as an issue that “needs to be kept alive.”

Although MISO should be compliant with the new NERC standard taking effect April 1, Jankowski said he’d like to follow up on the issue because MISO’s renewable power growth could affect how operations and emergency protocols work. (See “MISO Ready for Frequency Response Standard,” MISO Reliability Subcommittee Briefs.)

He added that the issue needs to be examined at length before action is taken.

“We think it’s premature to spend any appreciable time on revamping how reliability works. … It’s too difficult when you don’t know what you’re chasing,” he said.

Bill SeDoris, director of MISO integration for Northern Indiana Public Service Co., asked that the RSC keep an eye on how the SPP and MISO settlement payments play out after the elimination of the hurdle rate.