Generation owners will be exempted from federal open access transmission rules, allowing them to reserve excess capacity on their tie lines for the first five years of operation, under an order approved by regulators last week.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which has been studying the issue since a 2011 technical conference, said it will grant a blanket waiver from Open Access Transmission Tariff (OATT) requirements for “interconnection customer’s interconnection facilities,” or tie lines (RM14-11).

Under previous policy, a tie line owner must make excess capacity available to third parties unless it can justify its planned future use of the line. The new rule creates a five-year “safe harbor” period during which a tie line owner is assumed to have plans to use the excess capacity on its facilities.

The order eliminates the need for generation owners to seek OATT waivers, a requirement that the commission said created an undue burden. “While the commission has processed scores of requests for transmission tariff waivers in recent years, a third party has requested service, and thus required the interconnection customer to file a tariff, in only four instances total,” commission staff said in a presentation on the new rule.

Third parties seeking to obtain access to tie lines can do so through the procedures applicable to requests for interconnection and transmission service under sections 210, 211 and 212 of the Federal Power Act, which allow tie line owners to negotiate access with third parties.