Southwest Power Pool Inc. (SPP) has submitted its filing to comply with the regional requirements of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's (FERC) Order No. 1000.
In its compliance filing, SPP proposes a competitive solicitation model that promotes open competition for transmission projects 300 kV and above. The filing proposes to maintain SPP's highway/byway cost-allocation methodology, as well as SPP's integrated transmission planning (ITP) process approved by FERC two years ago.
The highway/byway cost-allocation methodology and the ITP process were developed and approved by SPP's stakeholders and SPP's Regional State Committee (RSC), which comprises state retail regulators in SPP's footprint. When the ITP process and the highway/byway methodology were approved, FERC heralded both as positive and innovative steps toward the construction of transmission in the SPP region.
"For more than a year, SPP's stakeholders have diligently worked to develop a competitive model for new transmission projects with the removal of a federal right of first refusal in the SPP footprint in accordance with FERC's policy contained in Order 1000," says Paul Suskie, SPP's senior vice president of regulatory policy and general counsel. "As a result of this diligent work, SPP's tariff revisions were approved unanimously by all stakeholder groups involved in the process."
