Strategy & Planning

Regional transmission organizations ISO-NE, MISO, PJM, and SPP (Joint RTOs) recently issued a position paper, Strategies for Enhanced Gas-Electric Coordination: A Blueprint for National Progress. It aims to identify issues for state and federal policymakers, which if appropriately resolved, can enhance the reliability of gas-electric coordination. To find out more on this important issue, PUF brought together experts from the Joint RTOs. Listen in on the discussion with ISO-NE VP of Operations and Market Administration Pete Brandien, MISO Executive Director of Market Operations JT Smith, SPP COO Lanny Nickell, and PJM VP of Federal Government Policy Craig Glazer.

Despite the license and permitting hurdles, utilities around the country are taking a harder look at pumped storage hydro options. Potential benefits from federal tax credits might make an asset like pumped storage, which has a long asset life, more attractive as a storage option.

Hydro has been critical to the integration of renewable energy. You couldn’t build enough renewables across a portfolio or a geographic area that could provide the kind of flexibility and reliability that hydro brings.

Hydropower’s role as a balancing resource is going to be more important than ever. Hydropower is reliable, flexible, and clean, which makes it a perfect companion to intermittent renewable energy resources.

PUF’s Paul Kjellander talked with two leaders on all issues pertaining to hydropower and what its future looks like. Bonneville Power Administration CEO John Hairston and Idaho Power CEO Lisa Grow have much to say on this important subject.

How much is enough? That’s so often the central question for those considering investments in our national defense. Along with secondary questions of nearly equal importance, such as, should we invest in this particular defense program? Or that one instead?

For more than a decade, EPRI has been studying AI and its potential impacts on the energy sector, and in the last six years, the Institute has accelerated its activities around AI and data science. To date, EPRI has been involved in more than 75 projects related to AI applications in the energy sector.

At the core of this transformation are the utility IT systems, which have historically focused on administrative support, customer billing, and essential network management. To support Grid Mod, these systems must be significantly upgraded.

“Here, the focus is on the high-voltage transmission infrastructure of one hundred thirty-two kilovolts and above, from an unfortunately overlooked perspective, that of the customers and ratepayers who will pay the bill.”

“We bring in processes and techniques that let us go through an area of concern, evaluate pole by pole, and make a determination of what is the likelihood of that pole being compromised by this storm or not targeting the invest.”