Texas QSE To Pay $260,000 Under Settlement With PUC Staff

May 17, 2023

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Copyright 2010-23 EnergyChoiceMatters.com
Reporting by Paul Ring • ring@energychoicematters.com

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The Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) would pay $260,000 under a settlement with Staff of the Public Utility Commission of Texas to resolve alleged violations of ERCOT Nodal Protocols §§ 6.4.6(1), relating to resource status; 6.5.7.5(2), relating to ancillary services capacity monitor; 8.1.1.3(3), relating to ancillary service capacity compliance criteria; and 8.1.1.4.2(1)(a), related to responsive reserve service energy deployment criteria.

Staff had alleged that, on eight days in 2019, LCRA failed to comply with ERCOT procedures under the protocols listed above. Generally, the alleged violations arise from incorrect resource status code and/or incorrect telemetry

The settlement notes that LCRA operates multiple qualified scheduling entities (QSEs) as that term is defined by ERCOT Nodal Protocols § 2.1, including QLCRA

In one of the alleged instances, the settlement states that, on April 1, 2019, during hour ending 23, ERCOT assigned a 347.4-MW responsive reserve service ancillary service supply responsibility to QLCRA. The settlement states that QLCRA failed to assign the entire responsive reserve service ancillary service supply responsibility at the beginning of hour ending 23.

The settlement states that, at 22:00, QLCRA assigned 51.7 MW of its responsive reserve service ancillary service supply responsibility to LOSTPI_CC1. The settlement states that, At 22:34, QLCRA changed the resource status code for LOSTPI_CC1 from ON to SHUTDOWN. The settlement states that, over the next three minutes, QLCRA increased the responsive reserve service resource responsibility for LOSTPI_CC1 to 337 MW. The settlement states that, at 22:48, QLCRA increased responsive reserve service resource responsibility for LOSTPI_CC1 to 347.4 MW and changed the resource status code back to ON.

The settlement states that, "Because of the incorrect telemetry of response reserve service ancillary service resource responsibility, ERCOT would not have been able to deploy the entire 347.7 MW of responsive reserve service until 22:48. Additionally, because of the incorrect resource status code telemetry beginning at 22:34, QLCRA telemetered a combined responsive reserve service ancillary service resource responsibility of 0 MW, which was 347.7 MW less than its responsibility for the hour."

LCRA asserts that this shortage was caused by a temporal constraint within the code of the Ancillary Service Monitoring (ASM) tool, which was unknown to LCRA at the time of the event but has since been remedied.

In another of the alleged instances, the settlement states that during hour ending 18 on July 29, 2019, ERCOT assigned a 366.6-MW responsive reserve service ancillary service supply responsibility to QLCRA. The settlement states that, during hour ending 19 on July 29, 2019, ERCOT assigned a 332-MW responsive reserve service ancillary service supply responsibility to QLCRA. The settlement states that QLCRA assigned its entire supply responsibility in both hours to multiple generation resources in its portfolio.

The settlement states that, at 17:59:20, ERCOT issued a 330-MW responsive reserve service deployment to QLCRA. The settlement states that ERCOT’s load frequency control system then altered QLCRA’s responsive reserve service deployment six times over the following 96 seconds, reflecting changing system conditions and QLCRA’s changed responsive reserve service ancillary service supply responsibility beginning at 18:00. The settlement states that ERCOT’s last responsive reserve service deployment was issued at 18:00:56 for a total of 315 MW. The settlement states that ERCOT recalled QLCRA’s responsive reserve service deployment at 18:05:12 when the system-wide frequency event concluded.

The settlement states that, in response to the deployment instructions, QLCRA lowered the telemetered value of its responsive reserve service ancillary service resource responsibility from 330 MW to 49.1 MW, indicating that 280.9 MW were available to be dispatched. The settlement states that this amount was 34.1 MW less than the final 315 MW RRS deployment instruction, which prevented SCED from dispatching the total required responsive reserve service MWs.

The settlement states that, "LCRA asserts that it was unable to determine the precise cause for the inaccurate telemetry of its RRS ancillary service supply responsibility. LCRA also asserts that the six different deployment instructions (including deployment quantity increases and decreases) received in less than two minutes, coincident with the onset of a new operating hour, appears to have contributed to its generation management system’s inaccurate telemetry output."

The settlement states that LCRA has undertaken various corrective actions

LCRA asserts the issues encountered on the eight days in 2019 described in the settlement were encountered while QLCRA was in the process of updating its Generation Management System (GMS) to a more stable platform. This project was completed by the end of May 2019.

LCRA asserts it developed logic and enhancements to provide improved visual indicators, alarms, automated data retrieval, file transfer validation of data used to better monitor and maintain QLCRA ancillary service obligations.

LCRA conducted training with appropriate QLCRA operations staff following the GMS upgrade project to ensure efficiency and accuracy of operation, therefore mitigating future potential impact. QLCRA operations staff are instructed to take immediate action should an ancillary service obligation shortage be identified.

Docket 55012

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