Flexibility

Integrated Distribution Planning

An Idea Whose Time Has Come

The next frontier, and the logical extension of integrated resource planning. Self-generation, the connected home, the celebrated internet of things – they all suggest it’s time to focus on the local grid.

In the Situation Room

Presidential attention raises the priority level for cybersecurity.

Have industry leaders and regulators turned a corner on efforts to make the grid more secure?

Transmission Policy in Flux

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.

Penalty Predictability Enhanced

FERC modifies its enforcement guidelines.

FERC’s revised policy provides greater predictability and transparency in the commission’s approach to determining civil and criminal penalties under its statutory authority. Despite a more systematic framework, however, FERC retains discretion to assess penalties based on the facts of individual cases.

What Happened in Maryland

State case has national implications for grid modernization.

Strict adherence to cost-of-service ratemaking led to what might be considered a Luddite decision in the Maryland PSC’s initial rejection of BGE’s smart-grid filing. More than 60 years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that ratemaking calls for “pragmatic adjustments” to regulatory policy, toward the goal of sensible and effective rate orders. Delaying modernization doesn’t serve the aims of customer choice, conservation or electric system efficiency.

Regulatory Reform in Ontario

Successes, shortcomings and unfinished business.

A rebuttal to conclusions made in three Fortnightly articles that service quality declined in Ontario because of a performance-based regulation plan implementation.

Storage Surge

New gas projects help globalize the U.S. market.

Underground storage allows gas users and traders to hedge against price volatility. Building more capacity will help North America fully integrate into global gas markets.

The Rush to Reliability

FERC races to impose NERC’s new rules, raising howls of protest in the process.

After pleading with Congress for so many years, and then at last winning the requisite legislative authority to impose mandatory and enforceable standards for electric reliability, to replace its legacy system of voluntary compliance, NERC finds itself at a curious juncture. It wants to slow the transition.

Getting IRP Right

Quantifying uncertainty in the planning process.

During the 1980s and early 1990s, integrated resource planning (IRP) was a required practice for many utilities. Then competitive wholesale markets, merchant generation, and restructuring initiatives led many utilities to abandon IRP.

While wholesale competition generally has been successful, the regulatory process changes it brought were less so. And utilities now are getting back into long-term resource planning studies to provide decision support for their “back to basics” business strategies.