IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - November/December 2014 - 28

While robust natural gas supply development is continuing
to spur interest in natural gas, questions about natural gas
and electricity integration persist.

Winter Weather
Scenarios
Duration of Risk
(Number of Days)
Total Winter Fuel
Supply Deficit (MMcf)
Average Daily
Generation Deficit
(MW Unavailable)

Median Minimum Maximum
(50/50)
(5/95)
(95/5)
34

10,680

439

21,931

1,310

366

1,793

figure 10. The duration of risk analysis for the 2019-2020
winter.

make gas and power service more reliable. Additional FERC
orders address ISO and RTO system scheduling and how
pipelines post information about released capacity.
A March 2014 notice of proposed rulemaking (NOPR)
issued by FERC proposed shifting the scheduling of the gas
day to better align with electric market scheduling and adding
two to three intraday nomination cycles to allow more flexibility in scheduling pipeline nominations. Some LDCs and western pipelines, however, expressed concerns that changing gas
day scheduling could result in additional costs and potential
unintended consequences (e.g., shifting problems westward).
Although these changes may help with the near-term
coordination of gas and electric system operations, the gas
transportation capability issues will remain. The Western
Interstate Energy Board, EIPC, Eastern Interconnection
States Planning Council (EISPC), and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas have sponsored studies on gas-electric
integration. In addition, a project currently being completed
for EISPC by ICF is focused on projecting the potential for
unmet fuel requirements and assessing multiple options for
meeting load, including new pipeline capacity, increased
conventional underground storage, addition of high-deliverability underground storage, incremental LNG peak-shaving
storage capability and/or addition of compressed gas storage, and incremental fuel-switching capability.

ISO-NE's Long-Term Response
to Gas-Electric Integration Issues
ISO-NE is approaching the gas-electric integration challenges
as an availability, reliability, and price issue and is attempting to
implement a number of internal and regional market responses
to mitigate this risk. In particular, ISO-NE is implementing
new approaches to coordination with its gas market partners.
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ieee power & energy magazine

ISO-NE will allow offers from generators to reflect different onand off-peak hourly prices and will let resources change their
offers during the operating day to reflect volatile gas prices.
Both of these efforts are targeted to begin in December 2014.
ISO-NE is also proposing the introduction of forward
capacity market (FCM) performance incentives (basically a
"pay for performance" approach) that would enhance incentives within the FCM to strengthen fuel supply arrangements. This proposal has been accepted by FERC (with
modification) and is targeted for the 9th Forward Capacity
Auction, which procures capacity resources for the period
from June 2018 to May 2019. The New England States Committee on Electricity recently proposed a new ISO-NE tariff
stream to fund regional gas and electric transmission, but
this approach is still being developed and raises several
questions including FERC approval and the details as to
which organization or organizations would own and manage
the daily gas capacity release.

Conclusion
The experience of the 2013-2014 winter exposed some
potentially serious challenges related to gas-electric integration. Significant questions concerning adequacy of gas
transportation infrastructure, intersector coordination, and
regulatory reform remain. ISO-NE's experience also illustrates that critical operational and contractual improvements, along with resource adequacy assessments, are key to
addressing gas-electric integration questions.

For Further Reading
ISO New England. (2004, 10 May). Final report on electricity
supply conditions in New England during the January 14-16,
2004 "Cold snap." [Online]. Available: http://www.iso-ne.com/
pubs/spcl_rpts/2004/final_report_jan2004_cold_snap.pdf
ISO New England. (2014, 19 June). "2014 Regional System Plan." [Online]. Available: http://www.iso-ne.com/trans/
rsp/index.html
EGOC meeting agendas, minutes, and materials are publically posted on the ISO-NE Web site. [Online]. Available:
http://www.iso-ne.com/committees/comm_wkgrps/othr/
egoc/index.html

Biographies
Mark Babula is with ISO New England, Holyoke, Massachusetts.
Kevin Petak is with ICF International, Fairfax, Virginia.
p&e

november/december 2014

http://www.iso-ne.com/ http://www.iso-ne.com/trans/ http://www.iso-ne.com/committees/comm_wkgrps/othr/

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - November/December 2014