Texas PUC Staff Seek Comments on Emergency Response Service Design, Changes

The Staff of the Public Utility Commission of Texas have issued a request for comment concerning Emergency Response Service (ERS) in ERCOT.

Staff invited interested parties to comment on:

Market Design

(1) Is ERS a necessary or valuable service from an operational or reliability perspective?

(2) Would daily procurement of ERS on the day prior to the operating day be desirable?

(3) What changes in price paid for the service could be expected if it were procured on a daily basis?

(4) How does ERS differ from non-spin reserve service? Would it be desirable to simply eliminate ERS and buy more non-spin?

(5) Should the existing annual cost cap on ERS procurement and cost allocation methodology (based on risk factors assigned to time periods) be replaced by an hourly megawatt capacity requirement varying on a daily or seasonal basis?

(6) Should the price for ERS be indexed to the clearing price of one of the existing ancillary services or some other reference price?

Participation by Load and Distributed Generation Resources

(7) How would procurement of ERS on a daily basis affect participation by load and distributed generation resources in the service?

(8) What cost would be incurred by participants in the ERS program if ERS were procured on a daily basis?

(9) How would current performance criteria, testing requirements and availability metrics need to be revised if ERS were procured on a daily basis?

(10) How would demand response assets that currently are assigned to the alternate baseline be accommodated if ERS were procured on a daily basis?

General

(11) What other changes should be made to ERS to increase its value or to improve participation in the service?

Project No. 45927