Texas PUC Chair Will Let Market Participant ERCOT Process Take Lead On Outage Cancellation Issues

During today's open meeting, DeAnn Walker, Chairman of the Public Utility Commission of Texas, said that she would like market participants at ERCOT to try to work out issues that have been raised concerning ERCOT's process for cancelling generator outages, rather than bringing the issue immediately before the Commission and having the Commission lead a review

As previously reported, the South Texas Electric Cooperative, Inc. filed a request that the Public Utility Commission of Texas, "initiate a review of ERCOT's outage cancellation actions and procedures, the increased costs caused by such actions that generators cannot avoid ... and the risks to consumers and reliability caused by outage cancellations during the limited time available for the performance of generator maintenance for summer readiness."

See background on STEC's request here

Walker said that the Commission should not interject itself in the process at this time, but said that the Commission should be available to respond if stakeholders reach a breakdown and need assistance

Her fellow commissioners generally agreed with this approach

Walker stressed that she is not interested in going back and "punishing" for any actions that have happened or dwelling on prior actions. Walker said that the focus is determining best practices going forward