Texas Conditionally Approves Entergy Texas Membership in MISO as Transmission Owner

The Public Utility Commission of Texas yesterday conditionally approved Entergy Texas' application to transfer the operational control of its transmission assets to the Midwest ISO.

A condition related to Auction Revenue Rights was substantively changed from what Commissioners originally reached consensus on last week, in response to a concern from Entergy Texas.

Specifically, the condition originally proposed by the Commissioners would have allowed any signatory to a non-unanimous stipulation (NUS) in the proceeding to object to the MISO tariff governing Auction Revenue Rights, and that such objection would lead to failure of the condition in the PUC's order, meaning that joining MISO would no longer have been found to be in the public interest.

Entergy Texas sought to remove this condition, arguing that it accorded any party to the NUS an effective veto right with respect to Entergy Texas' application, regardless of whether the proposed transition to MISO is in the public interest. No signatory to the NUS objected to Entergy's proposed change, which the Commission accepted.

Commissioner Kenneth Anderson said he personally thought that the ARR language change was a "bad deal" but as signatories to the non-unanimous stipulation did not oppose Entergy's change, he would not substitute his own judgment for that of the parties in this area. However, he admonished parties not to come back "crying" to the Commission if the provision does not work out the way parties thought it would. Anderson affirmed that the Commission would try to do what it could in any subsequent matter, but noted that the Commission may lack jurisdiction at that time.

Other conditions were adopted as drafted by the Commission last week. See prior story for full details on the conditions, including a requirement that Entergy Services, Inc., and Entergy Corporation, in addition to Entergy Texas, use best efforts to shorten the timeframe for Entergy Texas to exit the Entergy system agreement (which currently is 96 months).

Entergy Texas' MISO membership is also conditioned on all the other Entergy companies joining MISO.