A private "consulting" firm from California has concocted a "report" about its modeling of the ERCOT system.
Why? Why do ERCOT stakeholders need a separate report funded by private interests? Why isn't ERCOT's work sufficient for stakeholders?
ERCOT is an independent body whose whole business is modeling its own system.
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) manages the flow of electric power to 24 million Texas customers -- representing about 90 percent of the state’s electric load. As the independent system operator for the region, ERCOT schedules power on an electric grid that connects more than 46,500 miles of transmission lines and 570+ generation units. It also performs financial settlement for the competitive wholesale bulk-power market and administers retail switching for 7 million premises in competitive choice areas. ERCOT is a membership-based 501(c)(4) nonprofit corporation, governed by a board of directors and subject to oversight by the Public Utility Commission of Texas and the Texas Legislature. Its members include consumers, cooperatives, generators, power marketers, retail electric providers, investor-owned electric utilities, transmission and distribution providers and municipally owned electric utilities.
The company has been modeling energy systems “for more than 30 years and continuously sustains the most up-to-date information on every detail of the Texas grid including minor and major transmission upgrades as well as generation additions and retirement,” the company said upon announcing the report, which looks to new import and export capabilities that are on the way for ERCOT, including the integration of Lubbock Power & Light and the possible Southern Cross transmission project.
The time when an independent system operator needs "reports" from market participants to override its own reports and planning is the time when there's no point in even having independent system operators.
It's a bit presumptuous for a consulting firm in California to purport that it can do better modeling of the ISO's system than the ISO, don't you think? What's the intent here? Is the Public Utility Commission of Texas supposed to toss out any information from ERCOT and instead use a "report" created by a private party? That's absurd.
Chuck this "report" in the trash.