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November 17, 2024

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House Passes IRA, Sends to Biden’s Desk

The U.S. House of Representatives passed the Inflation Reduction Act (H.R. 5376) on Friday, sending the $740 billion package of tax, health and climate provisions to the White House for President Biden’s signature.

Pelosi IRA (CSPAN) Content.jpgHouse Speaker Nancy Pelosi announces the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act. | CSPAN

Democratic representatives standing before the speaker’s dais broke out in cheers and high-fives as Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) announced the final vote of 220-207, with four Republicans not voting.

Earlier in the day, Pelosi had vowed that once passed, the bill would head straight to Biden’s desk. “It will be ready in a matter of minutes for me to enroll it, and it will go directly to the president for his signature,” she said.

Biden, who watched the vote at the White House, quickly tweeted he would sign the bill in the coming week and also announced a celebration of the soon-to-be law on Sept. 6.

Passing the IRA “required many compromises. Doing important things almost always does,” Biden said.

National Climate Adviser Gina McCarthy was among other administration officials hailing the vote on Twitter, calling the IRA’s $369.75 billion in clean energy funding “our biggest climate investment ever, by far. This will save so many lives and create so many opportunities,” McCarthy said, crediting the bill’s success to “a broad, steadfast movement demanding a clean energy future.”

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), who negotiated the compromise version of the IRA with Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), also took to social media, calling the IRA “the boldest climate package in U.S. history. … The Democrats got it done!” he said.

The party-line vote followed more than three hours of heated debate with Democrats and Republicans exchanging familiar arguments — and mid-term election talking points — about the bill’s impacts, mostly in one-minute speeches on the floor. Republicans hammered away on claims that the bill on would increase taxes and inflation, and set IRA agents on working Americans, while Democrats hit back with bill provisions that would cap prescription drug costs for seniors on Medicare and accelerate the country’s shift to clean energy while lowering utility bills.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy argued that under the IRA, “your energy prices will now go through the roof. I look forward to every Democrat who votes for this bill … [explaining it] to their constituents when they’re making a choice about whether they pay [for] the energy to heat their homes, or they cut back on the gas to fill their tank.”

“We have a climate crisis, and the deniers have undermined our ability to respond,” countered Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.). “This bill responds and … consistent with the desires of the American people, will bring down the cost of energy for Americans by investing in developing and deploying cleaner, more sustainable energy technologies like electric vehicles and solar panels.”

Rocky Path to Passage

The version of the IRA that passed Friday has traveled a rocky path since September 2021, when Democrats first unveiled it as the $3.5 billion Build Back Better Act, a filibuster-proof budget reconciliation package with a range of social spending and clean energy incentives. Faced with opposition from the Senate’s centrist Democrats, Manchin and Sen. Krysten Sinema (D-Ariz.), Biden in October negotiated a trimmed-down BBB framework set at $1.75 trillion.

The House passed its version of BBB on Nov. 19, with a $2.2 trillion price tag, adding spending on progressive priorities such as four weeks of paid family and medical leave. BBB then went to the Senate, where negotiations hit a wall in December when Manchin walked away from further discussions.

“I have always said if I can’t go home and explain it to the people of West Virginia, I can’t vote for it,” Manchin said on Dec. 19 on “Fox News Sunday.” “And I cannot vote to continue with this piece of legislation. I just can’t. … This is a no.”

At the time, Manchin said the government should focus on inflation and the year-end surge in COVID-19 cases, driven by the fast-spreading Omicron variant. (See Manchin Says ‘No’ on Build Back Better.)

Manchin and Schumer resumed negotiations on the bill earlier this year, but Manchin balked at rising inflation figures in July, and once again appeared to close down talks on the legislation. (See Biden: ‘I Will not Back Down’ on Climate Action.)

The surprise announcement of a deal on the renamed Inflation Reduction Act came on July 27, followed by passage in the evenly split Senate on Aug. 7 — 51 to 50 — with Vice President Kamala Harris casting the tie-breaking vote. (See Senate Passes Inflation Reduction Act.)

Senate Republicans offered dozens of amendments during the Senate debate, two of which passed. A $35 per month cap on insulin prices for consumers with private insurance was stripped from the bill but was retained for Medicare patients. A second amendment revised the bill’s 15% corporate minimum income tax, exempting companies owned by private equity from the provision.

Prior to Friday’s debate, House Democrats also passed a resolution setting out the rules for the debate, which specifically closed off any attempts to further amend the bill. Under the rules for budget reconciliation, any changes in the House would have required the IRA to go back to the Senate for a second vote and possibly more Republican amendments.

‘Fully Unleashed’

For clean energy advocates and industry groups, the IRA’s expansion and extension of renewable energy production and investment tax credits was a big win. The bill extends existing wind and solar tax credits through the end of 2024 and then transitions them to technology neutral clean energy tax credits that continue through 2032. A direct-pay provision also allows nonprofit organizations, including electric cooperatives, to access the tax credits, which they have been unable to do. (See What’s in the Inflation Reduction Act, Part 1.)

“Electric cooperatives are leading the charge to reliably meet America’s future energy needs amid an energy transition that increasingly depends on electricity to power the U.S. economy,” National Rural Electric Cooperative Association CEO Jim Matheson said. “As co-ops continue to innovate, access to tax incentives and funding for investments in new energy technologies are crucial new tools that will help reduce costs and keep electricity affordable for consumers.”

Tom Kuhn, CEO of the Edison Electric Institute, the trade association for investor-owned utilities, said the 10-year time horizon for the credits will provide “much needed certainty to America’s electric companies over the next decade as they work to deploy clean energy and carbon free technologies. … This legislation firmly places the United States at the forefront of global efforts to drive down carbon emissions, especially when paired with the historic [research, development and deployment] funding” in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, he said.  

CEO of Advanced Energy Economy Nat Kreamer called out the bill’s tax credits for solar, storage and other clean energy manufacturers. “Clean energy technologies will be fully unleashed,” Kreamer said. “Clean energy manufacturers and developers alike will now have the right financial tools and the policy certainty they need to produce and buy the components that power these innovative technologies here in America.”

Other provisions of the IRA expand the 45Q tax credit, which had been a particular focus for the carbon capture industry. The bill ups the per ton incentives for carbon and direct air capture, for example, from $50 to $85 per ton for carbon sequestered in geologic saline formations, and also provides a direct pay option.

Madelyn Morrison, external affairs manager for the Carbon Capture Coalition, said the IRA “reinforces the essential role carbon management must play in achieving midcentury climate goals while providing a critical pathway to creating and retaining the high-wage jobs base communities and families depend upon, and positioning our nation’s industrial, energy and manufacturing sectors as leaders in technology innovation.” (See What’s in the Inflation Reduction Act, Part 2.)

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How Much Will the IRA Cut GHG Emissions, Home Energy Costs?

A panel of industry analysts Wednesday presented their estimates of how much the Inflation Reduction Act would reduce greenhouse gas emissions and its impact on average household energy costs.

The webinar hosted by Resources for the Future (RFF) came as the House of Representatives prepares to vote on the bill and its $369.75 billion in clean energy funding, which the Senate passed on Sunday. (See Senate Passes Inflation Reduction Act.)

Rhodium Group found that the average household savings from the IRA would run from a low of $27 per year to a high of $112 per year, depending on natural gas prices.

IRA Energy Savings (Rhodium Group) Content.jpgRhodium Group estimates the IRA will produce modest home energy bill savings for the average American household. | Rhodium Group

 

RFF’s own analysis of the bill forecasts a 5 to 7% cut in retail electricity prices by 2030, which could translate to per kilowatt-hour savings of about a half to one-and-a-half cents by 2030, again depending on natural gas prices.

“Between low and high natural gas prices, there’s roughly a swing of about over 10% in terms of retail electricity prices,” said Kevin Rennert, RFF’s director of federal climate policy.

But, he said, “having the IRA in place — and the clean electricity that is driven by the policy and incentives — actually reduces the effects of variability within natural gas. … Having more electricity on the grid certainly insulates you against price shocks.”

While they differed on details, all the speakers at the webinar agreed that their respective modeling programs found the IRA will provide energy savings across a range of variables. They also agreed that however sophisticated their software, some aspects of the bill would be hard to quantify.

Jesse Jenkins, head of Princeton University’s Zero carbon Energy systems Research and Optimization (ZERO) Laboratory, pointed to siting constraints for solar, wind and carbon capture projects. Examples include “the ability to scale up the workforce to deploy resources at this scale and the ability to expand networks like transmission and CO2 pipelines and storage to support this level of growth,” he said.

Clean Energy Incentives

In addition to natural gas prices, RFF’s analysis also factored in the potential clean energy incentives contained in the IRA, resulting in different scenarios with base and bonus levels of incentives. For example, the bill’s proposed technology-neutral clean energy investment tax credit (ITC), beginning in 2025, has a base of 6% of projects costs, but can be multiplied by five, to 30%, for meeting certain prevailing wage and apprenticeship requirements. (See What’s in the Inflation Reduction Act, Part 1.)

The technology-neutral incentives are “a big deal because it no longer will require an act of Congress for a new technology to be eligible for these credits,” Rennert said.

Another plus: the bonuses are “stackable” so that a single project can receive multiple bonus incentives, such as a bonus for meeting the prevailing wage and apprenticeship requirement and a second for project location in an “energy community” affected by the closure of a fossil fuel plant.

With such stackable bonuses, a project could earn a 50% ITC, Rennert said, and help slash GHG emissions from the power sector by as much as 75% — or an additional 4 billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions — below 2005 levels.

The ZERO Lab analysis also said the IRA’s clean energy incentives would cut power sector emissions 75% but pegged cumulative GHG emission reductions at 6.3 billion tons by 2030.

“The bill primarily reduces emissions by making clean energy cheaper,” Jenkins said. “It’s about making it cheaper and easier for businesses, for utilities, for households, for everyone across America to adopt cleaner energy sources, to make more efficient choices about upgrades to their businesses or homes and to electrify energy consumption in buildings and transportation.”

The law “could spur record-breaking growth in wind and solar capacity” depending on “how fast we can grow and continue smashing records each year,” he said.

While the U.S. added 15 GW of wind and 10 GW of solar in 2020, the ZERO Lab analysis shows the IRA more than doubling wind to 39 GW by 2030 and increasing solar almost fivefold to 49 GW.

Jenkins also sees the bill’s clean energy incentives having a ripple effect, making it “easier and cheaper for states or cities or companies at any level across the country to increase their climate ambitions. It also reinforces the economic benefits of any future federal regulations,” he said.

Oil and Gas Leasing

Both Rennert and Robbie Orvis, senior director of energy policy design at industry consultants Energy Innovation (EI), looked at the potential increase in GHG emissions that could be caused by the IRA’s oil and gas leasing provisions. The bill requires the Department of the Interior to complete stalled oil and gas leasing auctions in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coast of Alaska.

IRA Gallery (Resources for the Future) Content.jpgAt Wednesday’s webinar on IRA impacts were (clockwise from top left) moderator Karen Palmer, Resources for the Future; Kevin Rennert, RFF; Robbie Orvis, Energy Innovation; John Larsen, Rhodium Group; and Jesse Jenkins, Princeton ZERO Lab. | Resources for the Future

 

It also links the permitting of solar and wind projects on federal land to corresponding sales of onshore and offshore oil and gas leases.

RFF estimates the new leases will generate about 20 million metric tons of GHG emissions by 2030, a figure that would be more than offset by the 4 billion-ton cut in emissions from the electric power sector, Rennert said.

Orvis detailed EI’s modeling assumptions ― that 2% of the millions of acres available for oil and gas leasing would actually be sold at auction, and emissions from any wells drilled would be spread out over time. EI’s conservative estimate of emissions from those wells came in at 50 million MT, Orvis said.

“And that means for every one-ton increase in emissions from the oil and gas lease provisions [in the IRA], there’s 24 tons of emissions reductions from all the other provisions in the bill,” he said.

EI’s estimate of GHG emission reductions is 37 to 41% below 2005 levels by 2030, he said. The bill would also create about 1.5 million full-time jobs by in the same time frame, which should increase the national gross domestic product by close to 1%, he said.

The IIJA Connection

John Larsen, who lead’s Rhodium Group’s energy system and climate policy research, acknowledges that IRA contains many provisions that would help households fully electrify their homes or use the bill’s other tax credits for much bigger energy savings than the firms’ more modest estimates.

Rhodium’s analysis represents “what happens on an aggregate basis from all provisions,” he said in an email to RTO Insider. But, in a separate research note, Larsen also says that the IRA reductions are just one part of other factors —”improving energy market conditions and technology deployment driven by current policy” that Rhodium anticipates will drive down home energy costs by $730 to $1,135 per year.

Similar to RFF, Rhodium’s analysis of the IRA includes scenarios based on oil and gas prices and associated emissions. Thus, higher oil and gas prices produce a lower estimate of emission reductions, while lower prices could drive higher emission reductions.

With three scenarios — low, middle and high emissions — Rhodium is projecting the IRA will cut emissions 31 to 42% by 2030 compared to a 24 to 35% base case using existing policies, including the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.

Larsen expects that the IRA will provide added market momentum to IIJA’s funds for the development of emerging technologies like carbon capture and green hydrogen. (See What’s in the Inflation Reduction Act, Part 2.)

“The two bills are going to interact in a really important, powerful way,” he said.

“What the IIJA did was start that first level of deployment — demonstration projects, first commercial-scale [projects] — but there’s nothing after that to keep pulling that technology into the market. … We see the [difference] between a conventional hydrogen price and clean hydrogen getting closed in some instances because of the IRA tax credit provisions.”

Still, because of its “nascent nature,” Larsen does not expect green hydrogen to “contribute meaningfully to total GHG reductions through 2030; [the IRA] gets that technology to scale so it’s ready to go for the next wave,” he said.

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OMS RA Summit Confronts Midwestern Supply Squeeze

MADISON, Wis. — State regulatory staff and MISO executives found no easy answers to solve a burgeoning reliability crisis after converging this week for a resource adequacy summit.

The Organization of MISO States and the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Public Utility Institute hosted the Aug. 8-9 summit four months after MISO’s capacity auction indicated power shortfalls in MISO’s Midwestern footprint. (See MISO’s 2022/23 Capacity Auction Lays Bare Shortfalls in Midwest.)

Multiple state regulators and RTO leaders agreed that all participants should be more honest and open about resource planning and the possible impacts to neighboring areas in addressing a dwindling supply of consistent generation. MISO also repeated promises to discuss adjustments to its resource adequacy construct. (See MISO Promises Stakeholder Discussions on Capacity Auction Reform.)

North Dakota Public Service Commission Chair Julie Fedorchak said regulators are often in the “crosshairs,” balancing utility planning, corporate decarbonization goals and state legislation.

“We’re going to be blamed too,” joked MISO President Clair Moeller during an address on the first day of the summit.

Moeller said he has witnessed major change over the last six to eight years on the grid. He said prior to 2016, MISO had just one maximum generation event. Since 2016, the grid has issued 41 maximum generation warnings and events, he said. Moeller said more than ever, MISO’s footprint is an “ecosystem” of interdependencies between utility territories.

MISO Focuses on Reliability’s Attributes

Moeller said “resilience and efficiency are often enemies,” meaning entities having to “pay up for reserves.” He said MISO and its stakeholders must embark on honest conversations about the generation attributes the system will need over the next few years.

“Frankly, as a community, we’ve been slow to that discussion,” he said. Moeller told stakeholders that MISO intends to move “almost too fast” on defining essential resource attributes and to expect a similar timeline to the RTO’s long-range transmission planning.

MISO has scheduled a Sept. 21 stakeholder workshop to discuss generation’s attributes that benefit system performance.

Moeller said the grid operator “never wants to be in the way” of a utility’s decision to retire a resource. He also said the clogged interconnection queue boils down to an issue of money.

“The problem with the queue is money, not engineering,” he said. “We could connect everyone if they didn’t care about money … If you’re willing to sign a blank check, you can get on.”

Moeller warned that baseload retirements can’t be postponed indefinitely. He said a flurry of retirement deferrals can contribute to a “false sense of surplus.”

“These are old plants, and they need to go. The performance of them erodes,” he said. “I predict we’ll be back to very low-capacity prices next year because people didn’t like that medicine.”

Illinois Municipal Electric Agency’s Kevin Gaden said utilities retiring generation should anticipate how they will access reliability attributes when a particular plant is gone.

“That’s going to be a big problem, not just in Illinois, but the entire footprint,” he said. “If no one is going to own the resources, who is going to ensure that they’re there?”

Utilities’ long-term planning, Gaden said, usually focuses on just their service territories. He suggested they adopt a more holistic look into the nearby grid.

Michelle Bloodworth, CEO of coal lobbying group America’s Power, called for an “orderly, gradual” procession of coal plant retirements. She said a complete clean energy transition is “just not there yet.”

“Once those balancing resources are gone, they’re gone,” she said.

Alliant Energy’s Jeff Ripp said his utility’s resource planning repurposes its brownfield sites with renewable energy to avoid requesting a new interconnection to the system.

Xcel Energy’s Farah Mandich said the company is reusing its old coal plant locations because MISO’s interconnection queue remains too sluggish to add the renewable energy it is contemplating.

“Nobody wants customers to lose their electric service because we didn’t plan well,” she said.

Clean Energy’s Transition

MISO Vice President of External Affairs Melissa Seymour said the solar-dominated interconnection queue worryingly contains little in the way of controllable resources.

In a separate panel, Arkansas Electric Cooperative Corp.’s Andrew Lachowsky said he has “serious concerns” with solar generation’s ability to replace coal resources.

“We all need to work collectively, and that’s why we’re in the room today,” Seymour said.

She said states and utilities need to pay attention to the fleet’s attributes and “look beyond” their own generation planning for the impact they may be having on other states. She also said MISO must make changes to its own resource adequacy construct.

“We need to address these real-life impacts that we’re seeing and make sure we have a construct that works going forward,” Seymour said.

She also said MISO is “reevaluating” whether a vertical demand curve in the capacity auction still makes sense and will initiate discussion with stakeholders in October on introducing a sloped demand curve.

“I think we can all agree that no one thought this transition would be easy,” Illinois Commerce Commission Chair Carrie Zalewski said.

She said MISO’s capacity auction clearing at new generation’s cost, coupled with higher natural gas prices, is having a “major impact” on southern Illinois ratepayers. Zalewski said her commission is hearing about monthly bills that are about $150 higher year-over-year. However, she noted that customer bills in PJM’s northern Illinois footprint are less expensive.

Sustainable FERC Project attorney Lauren Azar said she is worried that utilities and regulators will have a “sphincter” response to MISO’s 2022-23 capacity auction results and return to planning for their own states in isolation.

“We’re in a power pool to be able to access the resources of others,” she said.

Sloped Demand Curve Likely

Michigan Public Service Commissioner Dan Scripps asked during an Aug. 9 panel whether members are happy with MISO’s current resource adequacy design. After a tense silence, Ameren’s Jeff Dodd joked that he needed “another Spotted Cow” — a local specialty beer — before answering.

Mandich said the RTO’s resource adequacy construct needs changes to accommodate a new system, though she declined to offer specifics.

“Where we’re going in the future, the old constructs won’t work … Where you have a shortage, something is broken. It’s clear that what we have now is not going to serve us,” she said.

“I think everyone knows that Ameren is a supporter of a sloped demand curve. That’s no secret,” Dodd said.

Dodd said while MISO’s capacity market design worked well in the past, it now needs a sloped demand curve, seasonal division and more realistic accreditation.

Independent Market Monitor David Patton said he would have been “shocked” five years ago to be invited to speak before regulators about using a sloped demand curve in the capacity auction.

“I think it’s a symptom of how the world is changing,” he said during a panel.

Patton said MISO’s current vertical demand curve is flawed because it doesn’t value megawatts based on their contribution to avoiding a loss-of-load event. The grid operator no longer has the “luxury” of clearing the auction at such low prices, he said. Patton added that MISO’s 10% retail choice supply is “killing” the RTO, forcing about 4-5 GW of merchant generation to retire prematurely because of economics.

He said because MISO was formed with such a large capacity surplus, it has taken a while for the resource adequacy picture to “catch up” with the near-zero capacity prices. He said the current capacity shortfall has little to do with the renewable energy transition and everything to do with inefficient pricing.

“We’re inviting free riders when we price capacity close to zero,” Patton said, noting Missouri was a net buyer of capacity in this year’s auction.

Patton also said MISO should raise its shortage pricing. He said larger payouts in shortage conditions will attract the quick-start, nimble resources that MISO needs.

“We can’t just focus on fixing the capacity market; we also have to get shortage pricing up to a level that’s efficient,” he said.

“We’re enjoying the benefits of capacity that was built under a different era,” FERC economist Emma Nicholson said in summing up the discussion.

NextEra Energy’s Aaron Bloom agreed that the right pricing will bring MISO the resource availability it needs.

“I cringe when I hear ‘attributes’ because I worry that will exclude some from the market. ‘You’re not tall enough to ride this ride,’ right?” Bloom said. He said that with solid technology, a lot of wind and solar and a little battery storage, his utility will be able to meet MISO’s system needs.

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California Adopts Country’s Most Ambitious OSW Targets

The mood was almost euphoric Wednesday as the California Energy Commission adopted the nation’s most ambitious long-term offshore wind goals, targeting a buildout of up to 5 GW by 2030 on the way to 25 GW by 2045.

The CEC approved the targets about a week after it released an updated draft report proposing to sharply increase earlier proposed goals of 2 GW by 2030 and 10 to 15 GW by 2045, which critics — including Gov. Gavin Newsom — contended were too conservative. (See California Boosts Offshore Wind Goals.)

Wednesday’s vote approved a final version of the report with the higher goals, which drew only praise from commenters at the commission’s monthly business meeting. Those speakers included labor representatives, members of environmental and community groups, students, a retired U.S. Navy admiral and a former state lawmaker.

“I think I share a belief that we all have that, in the future, we will look back to this moment, as you adopt this report with its recommended goals, as a critical milestone in our efforts to combat climate change,” said David Chiu, the former California assemblymember who drafted last year’s Assembly Bill 525. The law requires the CEC to “quantify the maximum feasible capacity of offshore wind” off the state’s coastline and set planning goals for 2030 and 2045.

“This is a momentous day,” said Commissioner Kourtney Vaccaro, the lead commissioner for the state’s offshore wind efforts. “I’m really excited. I wholeheartedly support approval of this report. And I am all in to do all of the work that needs to be done, because this is foundational. It’s a milestone.”

CEC OSW Map (NREL) Content.jpgNREL has identified five promising areas for wind development off the coast of California. | NREL

CEC Chair David Hochschild — who opened Wednesday’s meeting by lauding the “amazing event” Sunday when the U.S. Senate passed the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) — said the adoption of the offshore wind goals was part of a “trifecta year for us” that will include the signing of the IRA and this fall’s first California OSW lease auction by the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM). (See Senate Passes Inflation Reduction Act.)

BOEM this spring issued a proposed sale notice for five lease areas off the California coast, with auctions expected this fall for the Humboldt Bay and Morro Bay areas.

Commission Vice Chair Siva Gunda pointed to two key technical benefits that offshore wind will provide to a California grid increasingly reliant on intermittent solar resources.

“One is the load shaping it offers and the capacity factor that it offers, which is incredibly important for balancing the grid, but also in our opportunity to retire fossil assets as quickly as we can,” Gunda said. “So I think it’s an important element of the overall piece, and diversity [of resources] is critical.”

“This is one of the big pieces of clean, kind of firm power in a way,” Commissioner Andrew McAllister said. “Not quite in the sort of traditional definition, but it’s a great constant resource that’s predictable, and so it is a big piece of the puzzle that’s actually taking shape.”

Reshaping Communities

McAllister also pointed to the potentially transformative impact of a growing offshore wind industry on California’s economy, especially in struggling coastal communities.

“If you just envision what that is going to look like, in practical terms, for our economy, for our workforce … this is just a huge, huge endeavor that’s going to have all sorts of benefits for the state, and it’s going to reshape communities,” he said.

The economic and employment impact of offshore wind was a recurring theme in public comments during Wednesday’s meeting.

“When we first proposed AB 525, I said that we had already seen a preview of the future havoc that climate change will wreak in the form of heat waves, wildfires, droughts [and] rolling blackouts, and that we have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to transition to a new clean and green society in a way that could put thousands of Californians into high-skilled, well paying jobs,” said Chiu, currently the city attorney for San Francisco.

“We’re really impressed with the progress that the state is making towards offshore wind, not just for its impact on the transition to clean energy, but for its impact to labor,” said Larissa Petrucci, a research analyst with joint labor-management group NorCal Construction Industry Compliance. “As we move to a clean energy economy, we really want to see those skilled and trained workers build the machines that will move us to 100% clean energy. We want jobs that we can be proud of, and this is exactly what the offshore wind energy will provide.”

And while the CEC calls for 3 to 5 GW of floating offshore wind by 2030, Petrucci and other labor representatives called for the state to aim for the higher end of that range.

Speaking for the California State Building and Construction Trades Council, Mark Mulliner said the Humboldt area is a “desolate place” after the loss of jobs stemming from the closure of lumber mills.

“The best opportunity is what you guys are looking at approving,” Mulliner said, adding that the OSW industry will be a “huge part of changing the environment and changing the work environment for Humboldt and for the local communities.”

Trevor Zierhut, of LiUNA Local 585 in Ventura County, said the state is “facing a unique opportunity with determined stakeholders all working towards a common goal and the federal government actually moving forward at an unprecedented pace on this issue.”

But he cautioned that state officials should not neglect the need for new transmission to handle OSW output.

“If we aren’t planning big on transmission, we’re only doing half the work necessary to make the changes we all want to see,” Zierhut said.

Retired Adm. Dennis McGinn posed the state’s OSW efforts as a way to shore up the nation’s energy, economic and environmental security and quality of life. “California has the opportunity to seize this wonderful asset offshore as former [Assemblymember] Chiu outlined, and it is there for the taking.”

McGinn added that, as the former commander of the U.S. Third Fleet involved in operations off the California coast, “it is compatible to have military operations in training and offshore wind, producing great clean energy in a complimentary way.”

University of California, Merced student Cassandra Boyce delivered an emotional plea encouraging state officials to “go big” with offshore wind.

“We’re facing a climate crisis, and the only way we can solve it is to stop burning fossil fuels. I know that the goal of [over] 20 GW by 2045 is really going to support that movement towards a future that won’t just be clean, but healthy,” Boyce said.

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NERC, Texas RE Examine Wind Turbine Inverter Issues

In a joint report released Wednesday, NERC and the Texas Reliability Entity shared the lessons learned from a disturbance to ERCOT’s wind generation fleet earlier this year.

The Panhandle Wind Disturbance report covers the events of March 22, when faults at two separate wind facilities in North Texas caused output to be reduced by 765 MW and 457 MW respectively. Neither fault qualified for reporting as a Category 1i event under NERC’s event analysis process, which in ERCOT requires the loss of at least 1.4 GW to earn the label. However, in light of the ERO Enterprise’s efforts to examine the impact of inverter-based resources on the bulk electric system, Texas RE suggested that NERC and ERCOT join it to review the disturbance.

On the morning of the event, issues had already been building on the system for hours: freezing rain, snowfall and high winds were observed early in the morning, and generator operators “reported wind turbine icing and high wind speed cutoffs.”

The faults occurred at 4:16 and 4:47 a.m. CT near Amarillo. The first was an A-B phase fault on a radial 345-kV generator tie line, and the second was a B-C phase fault on a nearby 345-kV transmission circuit. ERCOT attributed the second fault to “galloping conductors,” a condition that occurs when ice forms on transmission towers and conductors and catches the wind, lifting the conductors in a galloping or jumping motion.

ERCOT Wind Output (NERC) Content.jpgERCOT wind output during the disturbances | NERC

Both faults cleared normally in 3.38 and 2.88 cycles, respectively. Based on data from supervisory control and data acquisition systems, the first tripped 273 MW of wind generation, after which additional wind plants in the area unexpectedly reduced power output by a total of 492 MW; the same unexpected power reduction occurred after the second fault, with 457 MW lost in all.

As a result of the generation loss, system frequency also fell. In the first event frequency dropped from 60.01 Hz to 59.9 Hz; ERCOT tapped 524 MW of generation responsive reserve service (RRS) in response, and the system recovered to 59.998 Hz within three minutes. During the second event frequency fell to 59.942 Hz but recovered to “nominal values” within 30 seconds without the deployment of RRS or load resources.

Analysis of the events found that the greatest share of generation reduction in the first fault was consequential tripping of wind resources, accounting for 36% of reduction. However, the report noted that such loss is expected for this kind of event. The next biggest cause, at 18%, was plant controller interactions that restricted “the ability of the plant to return” to normal operating levels. Multiple inverters at one facility were tripped by AC overvoltage, making this the third-biggest issue.

By comparison, in the second fault plant controller interactions counted for 35% of voltage reductions, followed by dynamic active power reduction at 31%. AC overvoltage tripping was third, with 16% of the reduction.

Wind Plant Reduction Fault (NERC) Content.jpgCauses of wind plant reduction for fault 1 (left) and fault 2 | NERC

The report concluded with recommendations for multiple stakeholders. For FERC, the authors suggested “significant overhauls” to the “interconnection procedures and agreements administered” by the commission to address gaps relating to interconnection studies, model quality checks and commissioning testing. Noting that FERC in June issued a notice of proposed rulemaking on interconnection procedures, the report said that NERC plans to push such changes in comments on the NOPR.

The report also urges NERC to update its reliability standards to account for the known performance issues in inverter-based resources, in particular by implementing a performance-based generator ride-through standard. Finally, the authors recommended that ERCOT follow up with facility owners on corrective actions and conduct a detailed model quality review and validation effort.

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NERC’s SPIDER Group Warns of Modeling Difficulties for DERs

In a white paper released on Wednesday, NERC’s System Planning Impacts from Distributed Energy Resources (SPIDER) Working Group warned that traditional approaches to power system planning analysis may not be adequate for the spread of distributed energy resources like rooftop solar panels and battery energy storage systems.

NERC formed the SPIDER group in 2018 to study the effect of distributed solar and battery facilities on bulk electric system reliability. The move was inspired in part by incidents like 2016’s Blue Cut Fire in California, when a fault on a transmission line led to the loss of about 1.2 GW of solar generation. (See FERC Accepts New Inverter Standard.) The group’s work includes reliability guidelines related to DER forecasting and modeling practices, as well as the standard authorization request for Project 2022-02 (Modifications to TPL-001-5.1 and MOD-032-1). (See NERC RSTC Revisits Rejected Standards Projects.)

Wednesday’s white paper provides an overview of SPIDER’s “efforts to quantify and qualify the manner in which DERs are changing the system planning process”; some of the issues related to the representation of DERs in power system planning models; and the DER-related gaps in existing planning methods that new software can help to bridge. It was created in collaboration with “a range of industry participants … representing utilities, ISOs, consultants and OEMs [original equipment manufacturers],” along with software vendors.

SPIDER pointed out in the report that rooftop solar and battery systems were “viewed as a distribution system concern only” when first introduced to the grid; however, events like the Blue Cut Fire proved this assumption incorrect. Citing studies in areas like Hawaii and California, the paper asserted that utilities will need to expect “a number of impacts on the bulk electric system” from DERs and warned that existing planning tools are inadequate for accounting for their effects.

“Future power system studies will require software tools that can track a large number of distributed resources … while providing the ability to observe and adjust the output of these resources across the entire simulation,” the white paper said. “At the same time, the addition of new DER tracking capabilities will need to be balanced against the increase in complexity for the user and data fidelity requirements that they will cause.”

The paper also identified “seams” between different types of power system studies, most notably between transmission and distribution studies. Because DERs straddle both of these elements of the BES, it is no longer sufficient to study them in isolation, the report warned; for example, when DERs inject power into the grid, they can impact the voltage and current dynamics of the distribution system along with “changing power flows at the bulk transmission level.”

In the short term, power system planners can improve the ability of transmission and distribution software tools to share data, but even with this, DERs present a challenge that may be difficult for a single software tool to analyze. A longer-term solution can be provided by co-simulation tools that are currently in “earlier development stages” and that might be able to “describe the full behavior of the system” as a whole.

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Ohio Supreme Court Gives Go-ahead to Icebreaker Wind Farm

The Ohio Supreme Court this week removed a major legal obstacle to the construction of Icebreaker Wind, a demonstration wind farm in Lake Erie, 8 to 10 miles northwest of downtown Cleveland.

In a 6-1 decision, the court ruled that the Ohio Power Siting Board’s May 2020 approval of the project was proper, ending a two-year legal battle that capped at least a decade of effort by the Lake Erie Energy Development Co. (LEEDCo).

The project would be the first freshwater wind project in the U.S. and have to stand up to winter ice flows on Lake Erie. It had been approved by the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Energy, the Federal Aviation Administration, the U.S. Coast Guard, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Ohio Department of Natural Resources before the PSB ruled on the issue. It had also won significant funding from DOE.

With six turbines on 4.2 acres of state-owned lake bottom, the project would have a total generating capacity of 20.7 MW. The city of Cleveland and Cuyahoga County had agreed to buy about a third of the output. The company must still find takers for the remainder. LEEDCo has also partnered in 2016 with a Norwegian wind developer experienced in offshore wind projects.

The PSB initially approved the project with the condition that LEEDCo turn off the turbines at night for up to 10 months of the year to avoid interfering with bird migration and bats. The company countered that it would not be able to attract or keep investors if it agreed to that provision, as overnight winds are generally more reliable for power production.

After months of negotiation in which LEEDCo committed to enhanced radar surveillance, a sophisticated new collision detection system and a commitment to shut down when or if birds began colliding, the siting board approved the project.

But two residents of an upscale lakeshore community near Cleveland appealed the approval. They argued that LEEDCo had not submitted sufficient evidence for the board to determine the impact of the turbines on birds and bats. The board, which by then had decided to require LEEDCo to report bird collisions, rejected the argument and two subsequent appeals of its decision.

Writing for the court’s 6-1 majority decision, Justice Jennifer Brunner explained that the board collected the necessary research to allow Icebreaker to begin construction, while also requiring more data before the company can operate the turbines.

“Rather than requiring Icebreaker to resolve those matters before issuing the certificate, the board determined that the conditions on its grant of the application were sufficient to protect birds and bats and to ensure that the facility represented the minimum adverse environmental impact,” Brunner wrote.

LEEDCo Board Chairman Ronn Richard, CEO of the Cleveland Foundation, said Ohio has no choice but to embrace the energy transition to meet the state’s power needs. He noted that Intel’s decision to build the world’s largest computer chip factory near Columbus includes a commitment to power 100% of its operations with renewable energy. Other companies in Northeast Ohio and throughout the state have also set ambitious renewable targets.

“We’re pleased with the ruling from the Ohio Supreme Court,” Richard said. “The Cleveland Foundation has supported Project Icebreaker from its inception because this is about more than clean energy; this is about a healthy economy and a healthy community. Project Icebreaker shows that Northeast Ohio — and the entire state of Ohio for that matter — is open for businesses.”

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School Buses Uniquely Suited to V2G Technology, CT Green Bank Says

The CT Green Bank told Connecticut regulators Thursday that they should look closely at vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology for the state’s school bus fleet in their investigation of medium- and heavy-duty electric vehicle (M-HDEV) integration into the power grid.

“There is potential for electric school buses to play a role in reducing peak demand and increasing resiliency of our communities,” CT Green Bank CEO Bryan Garcia said during a Public Utilities Regulatory Authority hearing for the investigation (Docket 21-09-17).

But Garcia also urged regulators to be patient when considering technologies that affect school children.

“We wanted to note that when we think about electric school buses as resources, we need to crawl before we walk and walk before we run,” Garcia said.

In May, Gov. Ned Lamont signed a bill that sets deployment targets for zero-emission school buses of 100% by 2030 for environmental justice communities and 100% by 2040 for all communities.

“School buses, uniquely, have predictable charging locations and times, which can allow them to [support the grid] without negatively impacting their operating schedules and their use as a transit asset,” Sara Harari, associate director of innovation and special advisor to the president at CT Green Bank, said in hearing testimony.

Coordinating and deploying V2G technology for electric buses and other M-HDEVs would support the authority’s goals of integrating new transportation loads and distributed energy resources into the grid cost-effectively, according to Harari. It would simultaneously lower the cost of the state’s energy transition by delaying or avoiding infrastructure upgrades, she said.

The benefits of V2G for the grid would also come with challenges.

“For all M-HDEVs, including school buses, the additional [charge and discharge cycles] required to participate in V2G accelerates the degradation of the battery, thus shortening the useful life of the vehicle,” she said. The frequency of kilowatt hours discharged with V2G participation, she added, could also reduce the EV warranty coverage.

Realizing a V2G school bus fleet will require utilities to have a much better understanding of the temporal and locational needs of the grid, Harari said.

“The Green Bank is not aware of either of the Connecticut-based utilities having this capability today,” she said.

Garcia pointed to the authority’s recently established Innovative Energy Solutions program as the right place for the state’s utilities to test managed charging and discharging for electric school buses. PURA tasked the utilities with administering the program in collaboration with the authority and stakeholders to innovate within the electric sector to meet state climate goals.

In its order establishing the innovation program, PURA estimated that the utilities would issue the first program solicitation in January. Pilot projects chosen under the program will have a $5 million maximum potential award.

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Baker Signs Bill to Boost Clean Energy in Mass.

After a few days of wavering, Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker signed a compromise climate and clean energy bill sent to his desk by the state legislature.

The wide-ranging bill, a follow-up to last year’s legislation setting emissions targets, aims to act on those goals by reducing emissions in the state from generation, transportation, buildings and more, with a heavy focus on offshore wind.

The new law removes the price cap for wind developers, while also adding new tax incentives, grants and loans for the industry. And it will enable the state to work with other New England states and the federal government to procure transmission for offshore wind.

“The sweeping energy bill signed into law today showcases why Massachusetts continues to be a national leader in offshore wind development,” said John Begala, vice president of federal and state policy at the Business Network for Offshore Wind. “The procurement reforms and historic investments will help the state fully realize … economic and environmental benefits, leading to a stronger offshore wind industry with greater job creation, new economic activity, and a more reliable and affordable power sector.”

The law also takes on transportation emissions, banning the sale of new gas-powered vehicles after 2035, requiring the installation of new charging stations across the state and updating Massachusetts’ electric vehicle rebate to include more eligible vehicles. (See Mass. Legislators Reach Deal on Clean Energy Bill.)

The EV portions have excited advocacy groups like the Green Energy Consumers Alliance, as well as those in the private sector who are seeing growing business from the early days of the state’s EV boom.

In a recent interview with RTO Insider, Matthew Guarracino, the CEO of Lynnfield-based JM Electrical, said that his firm has been seeing more and more demand for charging infrastructure installations. The new law will only increase that, he said.

“The vehicles are one half of it, and the vehicles are great, but the challenge is getting the infrastructure put in the same places as the vehicles. The infrastructure is lagging a bit behind,” Guarracino said. “So it’s great to see the federal government and state putting money behind this to move along that infrastructure.”

One of the bill’s most controversial provisions, which almost led Baker to sink it, will let 10 communities in Massachusetts ban fossil fuel hookups in new construction, in an attempt to reduce emissions from buildings.

That section, along with the rest of the bill, has enthused environmental advocates.

“This bill is a big deal,” Ben Hellerstein, state director for Environment Massachusetts, said in a statement. “With this bill becoming law, leaders in Massachusetts of all political stripes are showing that states can take meaningful climate action. This bill gives me hope that we can work together to build a future where all of us can thrive. We’re thrilled for our commonwealth to play a key role in building a world powered by 100% clean energy.”

Baker had tried to make several significant amendments, including to weaken the fossil-free building pilot, in the waning hours of the legislative session. But lawmakers left most of them on the table and sent it back to the governor’s desk for a signature or veto.

The governor eventually signed, but not without regrets.

“Because the legislature rejected virtually every meaningful amendment I put forth, this bill does not have the same shared sense of purpose that all previous climate legislation embodied, which is unfortunate,” he wrote in a signing letter.

“We all know the commonwealth faces significant challenges in dealing with two existential threats: climate change, and housing supply and affordability. This bill does not move Massachusetts in the right direction on housing. And the process by which many provisions in this bill are implemented will determine if this bill will make significant progress toward our climate goals,” Baker continued.

Funding for parts of the bill is also still wrapped up in a separate piece of legislation that failed to make it past the legislative deadline, but key lawmakers say they’re confident it will come together in informal sessions over the coming weeks.

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SPP Restricts Board, RSC In-person Attendance

SPP said Tuesday that it is limiting attendance at its in-person Board of Directors, Members Committee and Regional State Committee meetings scheduled for October at its Little Rock, Ark., headquarters.

Citing a recent rise of COVID cases in Arkansas and the disease’s persistence, the grid operator said it will restrict access to “rostered members” of the groups and a “handful” of SPP support staff.

“We did not make this decision lightly,” SPP said in an email to stakeholders. “We want to protect the health of our stakeholders and mitigate risk for our staff working on campus. We will miss the opportunity to see some of you in person.”

The RTO said it will stream the meetings for its stakeholders, promising an “immersive experience for those who attend virtually.”

Arkansas’ COVID case count has grown to more than 900,000, about 30% of the state’s population. The average daily increase over a rolling seven-day period recently fell to 962, its lowest level since early July. Only about half of the state’s residents are vaccinated.

The in-person meeting, although lighter in numbers, will be the groups’ second since January 2020. They last met together in Dallas in April.

Under SPP’s new meeting schedule, the board and RSC will alternate in-person and virtual meetings with the Markets and Operations Policy Committee and Strategic Planning Committee each quarter. The two committees met in Denver in July; they are scheduled to next meet in-person this January in Oklahoma City.