PJM’s Reserve Certainty Senior Task Force (RCSTF) is voting on a PJM proposal to add hourly differentiated notification times to the RTO’s day-ahead (DA) energy market. (See “Hourly Notification Times,” PJM MRC/MC Briefs: Aug. 21, 2024.) 

During a Sept. 5 task force meeting, PJM’s Joe Ciabattoni said generation notification times have become an important input for determining reserve eligibility, especially for offline, non-synchronized resources.  

The vote is being conducted virtually through Sept. 12, with expedited endorsement sought at the Markets and Reliability Committee and Members Committee on Sept. 25. The tightened schedule would allow for the changes to become effective for the upcoming winter. 

Hourly notification times can only be submitted in the real-time (RT) market, creating a discrepancy that Ciabattoni said can lead to units being assigned a DA reserve commitment that they cannot carry with their RT notification times. 

Joel Romero Luna, senior analyst with the RTO’s Independent Market Monitor, said the main use case for changing hourly notification times is to allow gas-fired generators to reflect pipeline restrictions that cause them to become less flexible. He said the Monitor has guidelines for how generators should use notification times to reflect gas nomination cycles, so there shouldn’t be much variety in how notification times are used. 

The change would require revisions to Manual 11: Energy & Ancillary Services Market Operations and Tariff Attachment K. 

Rebecca Stadelmeyer, Gabel Associates’ director of RTO services, suggested that the proposed language allowing hourly notification times used to commit non-synchronized and 30-minute reserves be consistent with references throughout Manual 11 and suggested replacing the 30-minute reserve with secondary reserves. Ciabattoni said PJM will consider the amendment. 

Task Force Shifting to Long-term Work Areas

PJM’s Danielle Croop said the RTO is not planning to rework a proposal to replace the 3,000-MW target for 30-minute reserve procurement with a formula that accounts for forecast peak loads and gas contingencies. Following the MRC’s rejection of the package in July, stakeholders told PJM they were uncomfortable with the lack of tariff language to accompany the change. (See “Stakeholders Endorse Reserve Rework, Reject Procurement Flexibility,” PJM MRC Briefs: July 24, 2024.) 

Croop said PJM believes the status quo language allows the change by pointing to the manuals to determine the reliability requirement. In the absence of further direction from stakeholders, she said it is not clear how PJM should proceed. 

Task Force Chair Lisa Morelli said in future meetings, the working group will pivot to its long-term work, which includes creating reserve product participation requirements and incentivizing resource flexibility.