CAISO will seek to protect neighboring balancing authority areas if investor-owned utility members de-energize transmission lines due to wildfire threats.

The Western Energy Imbalance Market continued expanding as the Sacramento Municipal Utility District became the first publicly-owned utility to begin participating in CAISO’s real-time electricity market for the West.

The balancing area for the Sacramento Municipal Utilities District signed an agreement allowing SMUD to join the Western EIM in 2019.

The Sacramento Municipal Utilities District (SMUD) will join the Western EIM in spring 2019 at the earliest, according to the head of BANC.

The Sacramento Municipal Utility District will join the CAISO EIM and other members of the Balancing Authority of Northern California (BANC) may follow.