Mountain West Transmission Group moves closer to SPP membership
Full integration off Mountain West into SPP is a process that will take years, but the board this week approved the next phase. According to a statement, the vote results from a year of negotiating the terms and conditions of Market West’s proposed membership.
SPP says integration will take about two years, though reliability coordination services will be implemented in late 2019.
The board approved a set of policies that will govern Mountain West’s membership, including provisions for east and west balancing authority areas and planning regions that will follow the same transmission planning processes. Also addressed: cost allocation of transmission expansion specific to each planning region, and the joint dispatch of electricity via SPP’s wholesale market under a single set of rules.
SPP’s Regional State Committee would also be expanded to include state commissioners from the Mountain West region.
But Mountain West’s move will have impacts on others. The coalition of 10 electricity service providers has more than 6 million customers, which will mean fewer customers for Peak Reliability, its current reliability coordinator.
