By Tom Kleckner DALLAS — During an unusually animated meeting last week, SPP’s Strategic Planning Committee eventually agreed that it was the correct body to take up the contentious issue of cost shifts when new members join existing transmission-pricing zones. “I think this is a policy decision all the way,...

DALLAS — SPP’s Markets and Operations Policy Committee last week overwhelmingly approved a Tariff revision request that would replace the old capacity margin terminology with a 12% planning reserve margin requirement, the RTO’s first such change since 1998. Richard Ross, AEP | © RTO Insider The Regional Tariff Working Group’s...

By Tom Kleckner DALLAS — SPP stakeholders last week endorsed $201.5 million in transmission projects as part of the RTO’s Integrated Transmission Planning process, despite objections from several entities. The ITP’s final 2017 10-Year Assessment recommended 14 projects in the southern part of SPP’s footprint, clustered in the Texas-Oklahoma Panhandle...

By William Opalka WESTBOROUGH, Mass. — Stakeholders have until Feb. 25 to comment in ISO-NE’s first implementation of the public policy requirements of FERC Order 1000. The RTO is seeking stakeholder comments on federal, state and local statutes and regulations that could require new transmission. | Avangrid It is the...

By Amanda Durish Cook FERC last week found that MISO and PJM have largely complied with commission directives issued in an order resolving a complaint by Northern Indiana Public Service Co. over interregional planning (EL13-88-001, et al.). [caption id="attachment_37079" align="alignright" width="200"] Solomon | © RTO Insider[/caption] But the RTOs still...

FERC last week ordered American Electric Power and FirstEnergy subsidiary Allegheny Power to refund more than $7 million to ratepayers for the canceled Potomac-Appalachian Transmission Highline (PATH) project (ER09-1256; ER12-2708). The ruling upheld most of the $10 million in refunds recommended in an initial ruling by Administrative Law Judge Philip...

CARMEL, Ind. — MISO will conduct three new separate, but related, studies this year that could identify a transmission solution for the RTO’s constrained interface between its North and South regions. Ghodsian | © RTO Insider The efforts include a market congestion planning study, which is part of MISO’s 2017...

By Tom Kleckner DALLAS — SPP stakeholders last week spent the remains of a meeting cut short by weather-related travel problems discussing staff and member solutions to the RTO’s Z2 crediting process. [caption id="attachment_37073" align="alignright" width="200"] McAuley | © RTO Insider[/caption] In the end, the Z2 Task Force came no...

ISO-NE will use the same zonal boundaries for its next two Forward Capacity Auctions. In FCA 10 last year, ISO-NE used two zones: Rest of Pool, which comprises Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, and western and central Massachusetts; and Southeastern New England (SENE), which includes Northeast Massachusetts/Greater Boston and Southeast...

FERC on Thursday accepted a settlement that replaces the New York Power Authority’s stated transmission rates with a cost-of-service formula including a base return on equity of 8.95%. NYPA will receive an additional 50 basis points for its participation in NYISO (ER16-835). Lineman on transmission pole | New York Power...