BGE Stresses Need for November 1 Effective Date for Standard Electronic Transactions for Gas Market

Although a working group report has suggested that the Maryland PSC allow natural gas distribution companies to use proposed new standard electronic transactions effective December 1 (see Matters, 10/25), Baltimore Gas & Electric reiterated in a filing with the PSC that it needs the effective date of the new standards on its system to be November 1, 2010.

BGE had asked for a November 1 effective date in an earlier tariff filing to incorporate the standards, which will be addressed by the Commission at today's meeting (8/11).

"BGE is requesting an earlier implementation date for UETs [uniform electronic transactions] because as BGE originally informed the Commission in its Informational Filing dated August 10, 2010 regarding implementation of UET (Maillog No. 124736), if BGE is not able to implement UETs on November 1, 2010 as planned, implementation will need to be postponed until after the 2010/2011 Winter Heating Season to avoid any potential adverse Distribution System Operational impacts that might result from implementing UETs during this critical time period when its computer system is dedicated to heating season operations and communications between BGE and its suppliers."

Several competitive suppliers interested in entering the Maryland retail market have delayed their market entry until the implementation of the standard electronic transactions to avoid devoting time and money in developing backoffice systems to conduct business under the current protocols, given the imminent implementation of standard electronic transactions.

"Also important, BGE's request for an earlier effective date for UET implementation will facilitate Choice. Several new suppliers are awaiting UET implementation to enter the Gas Choice Market, and when the UETs were finalized by the RM35 Technical Working Group, BGE and suppliers engaged in UET testing for two months and are in the process of completing testing, allowing BGE and its current suppliers to implement UETs by November 1, 2010," BGE said.

"BGE has planned and blocked out a time period for an outage during the weekend of October 30 and 31 to support a November 1, 2010 implementation. Additionally, in BGE's RM35 Compliance Plan that was approved by the Commission on July 14, 2010, BGE stated there are several BGE Choice Program improvements (e.g., the twelve calendar day enrollment period) that related to UET implementation and therefore would be implemented concurrently with UET. These program improvements would also have to be postponed if the November 1, 2010 date is missed," BGE added.