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Gas-Electric interdependencies and the effects of Storm Uri stimulate real action
Yesterday, I attended a NAESB kickoff meeting for an initiative to harmonize natural gas and electric system integration and address inter-dependencies (seams issues). This NAESB initiative was inspired by a request from FERC Chairman Glick and NERC CEO Jim Robb to work on resolving cold weather issues identified by NERC in its Cold Weather report on the February 2021 winter storm Uri that had devastating and fatal effects in Texas.
The meeting focused on describing the "purpose of this initiative" and the justifications for why this is needed now. The focus is being provided by Key Recommendation 7 (page 195) in "FERC, NERC, and Regional Entity Staff Report on the February 2021 Cold Weather outages in Texas and the South-Central United States – November 16, 2021". The report suggest that this initiative will "identify concrete actions (consistent with the forum participants jurisdiction) to improve the reliability of the natural gas infrastructure system necessary to support the Bulk Electric System. Options for establishing the forum could include a joint task force with NARUC, a Federal Advisory Committee, or FERC-led technical conferences.Ideally, the forum participants will produce one or more plans for implementing the concrete actions, with deadlines, which identify the applicable entities with responsibility for each action".
This initiative may not produce the typical business practice standard recommendation artifact of a typical standards development effort but it will follow the NAESB/ANSI transparent/open process. Similar initiatives were successfully accomplished by NAESB in the past, i.e. FERC requested that NAESB develop e-tariff guidelines across Natural Gas, Electricity and Oil industries, which have been in effect in FERC's e-filing system for over 10 years. NAESB has a successful track record organizing cross industry (Gas and Electric ) collaborations in the creation of consensus business practice standards, which makes NAESB the ideal facilitator and forum for this work effort.
I look forward to engaging in the very important initiative within NAESB.
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