PJM Plans Studies to Remove Transource IEC From its Plan

Well, it seems that didn't take long.  PJM issued a statement yesterday according to trade press RTO Insider.

Officials at PJM said they were also reviewing the PUC’s decision and that it “appreciates the commission’s consideration.”

“PJM will commence the appropriate planning studies to determine next steps, including identifying any potential reliability issues due to removal of the project from the Regional Transmission Expansion Plan,” the RTO said in a statement.

So PJM is removing the IEC from its plan?  Is that some kind of Freudian slip or a sudden realization?

Dear Dr. Freud would probably also be verrrrry interrrrested in PJM's sudden interest in doing planning studies to identify any potential reliability issues due to removal of the project from its plan, since it refused to do these kinds of studies during the PUC case, insisting that some old data was good enough to determine there was a serious reliability issue that only IEC could solve. 

Was PJM lying then, or is it lying now?

I seem to remember PJM refusing to do these very same studies to support the project's "reliability" claims at the PUC.

The OCA also noted that Transource’s assertions regarding “reliability” as a basis for need refer to a single generation deliverability test performed by PJM in 2018.  Further, the OCA noted PJM neither, performed its full suite of reliability tests to confirm that these reliability violations will result in 2023, nor, performed another generation deliverability test since 2018 which may confirm or refute the results of the 2018 test.  

If PJM didn't do these studies during the PUC case, then it did not have to recognize that there is no reliability issue IEC must solve.  PJM's new studies may magically determine that the project isn't needed after all, and then PJM can remove it from the RTEP.  No fuss, no muss!

Hit it, Alanis...