Compliance Report
TRANSAC
September 13, 2017
Update
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) was established by the Energy Policy Act of 2005. It may have five members; however, three members are needed for a quorum. They are appointed by the President with the approval of the Senate. No more than three may be from one political party. Decisions and rulings are governed by a majority vote of the quorum present. FERC has been lacking a quorum since Commissioner Norman Bay resigned at the end of January. Senate confirmation hearings were started May 25 for two Republican nominees, Robert Powelson and Neil Chatterjee. They were sworn in on August 10, 2017. On August 24, President Trump nominated Democrat Richard Glick and Republican Kevin McIntyre to be members of FERC. Neil Chatterjee is the acting FERC Chairman until Kevin McIntyre is sworn in. The next monthly meeting will be on September 20, 2017; hence, the Commission will soon begin voting on the orders that have been backlogged.[1]
TPL-001-4, Transmission System Planning, is being modified to TPL-001-5. It addresses “Single Point-of-Failure (SPF)” and will include non-redundant components of a Protective System. Comments on the first draft were due by May 24, 2017.[2]
Another new standard is TPL-007-1, Transmission System Planned Performance for Geomagnetic Disturbance Events. It was approved by FERC on September 23, 2016. Requirement 1 became effective July 1, 2017, with the remaining six requirements taking effect over the next five years. A new version, TPL-007-2 was issued in July. More requirements were added.
A complete set of Reliability Standards, updated August 1, 2017, along with a Glossary of Terms, is available on the NERC website.[3]
NWEPage1September 13, 2017
[1] FERC.gov/media/news-releases/2017/
[2] TPL-001-5
http://www.nerc.com/pa/stand/project_201510 single points of failure_tpl001_dl/tpl-001-5_draft_clean_04252017.pdf
[3] NERC Standards: http://www.nerc.com/pa/Stand/Reliability%20Standards%20Complete%20Set/RSCompleteSet.pdf