More planning, fewer incentives, and a black swan on the horizon.
The transmission superhighway still needs major investments. Rate incentives were working -- until FERC started backing away from them. FERC should assert its authority more aggressively to promote the vision of a robust interstate grid.
A pragmatic new approach to assuring reliability.
Randall Speck and Kimberly Frank
The latest dispute over PJM’s bidding rules has raised the level of uncertainty in organized electricity markets. Efforts at reform have created a market structure so jumbled that it can’t produce just and reasonable rates -- or assure adequate supply resources. It’s time for FERC to consider alternative approaches to market design.
Resource planning and forecasting in a changing climate.
Robert E. Livezey and Philip Q Hanser
Utility planners depend on an accurate estimate of normal weather to forecast resource needs and costs. But as the climate changes, so must the definition of ‘normal.’
Only behavioral change will reduce energy consumption.
Standards and technology don't reduce energy consumption, despite the claims of efficiency zealots. Real energy savings only come through behavioral change.
Creative destruction is coming, and it can’t be stopped.
With Order 1000, FERC shows it’s willing to blow up uncompetitive structures, as with trustbusting under Teddy Roosevelt, and the more recent Bell breakup.
APPA questions the benefits attributed to organized power markets.
Unless the regulatory paradigm fairly balances the interests of both load and generation, the utility industry will be condemned to continued upheaval.
Order 1000, the RTOs, and the power of incumbency.
In Order 1000, FERC wanted—among other things—to open grid development to private developers. But FERC’s natural allies—the regional transmission organizations—are refusing to go along with this new vision.
Microgrids begin to make economic sense.
Michael T. Burr, Editor-in-Chief
With microgrids in place, doomsday preppers wouldn't need to worry so much about a zombie plague.
Technology is changing the game. Is your utility ready?
Although today microgrids serve a tiny fraction of the market, that share will grow as costs fall. Utilities can benefit if they plan ahead.
Analyzing the Order 1000 comply filings from non-RTO regions.
Last fall, utilities across the country began filing tariffs with FERC to explain how they’ll comply with Order 1000. That’s quite a handful, but maybe not a stretch for the RTOs. Not so for the non-RTO regions.
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