Commissioner-led Reliability Technical Conference

10:00 am      Chairman’s and Commissioners’ Opening Remarks  

10:30 am      Presentation on the State of Reliability

• Jim Robb, President and Chief Executive Officer
  North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC)

10:40 am      Panel 1: The State of Reliability in a Changing Energy Landscape - Operational Challenges of Integrating Large Loads in Evolving System Dynamics

The electric grid is undergoing rapid transformation driven by unprecedented load growth, the emergence of large, energy-intensive loads, and the accelerating deployment of inverter-based resources (IBRs).  Data centers, Artificial Intelligence (AI) compute campuses, industrialization, and other large loads are developing at a pace that challenges traditional planning and operational frameworks.  Meanwhile, the retirement of conventional baseload generators combined with the addition of solar, wind, and battery energy storage systems (BESS) are reshaping system dynamics, introducing new complexities and challenges related to reserve margins, inertia, protection systems, fuel supply, and disturbance response.  

This panel may include a discussion of the following topics and questions:  

1. How should entities model and plan for the rapid emergence of large, energy-intensive loads, such as data centers and AI compute campuses, whose scale, timing, and operational characteristics challenge traditional interconnection, transmission planning, and resource adequacy frameworks?  What are some lessons learned from the integration of large loads (such as the necessity for validated dynamic load models, updated commissioning procedures, and mandatory disturbance monitoring at points of interconnection)?
2. ERCOT is proposing to require advanced grid support functions (e.g., fast-frequency response and synthetic inertia) for future BESS in response to reliability events and operational trends such as frequency excursions, voltage instability, and IBR-driven oscillations.  Are these same issues present elsewhere, and should similar requirements be applied nationwide?
3. How should operators quantify and manage the reliability implications of declining system inertia in regions with rapid interconnection of large loads and where IBR penetration is accelerating and replacing conventional generation? 
4. What are the primary cybersecurity and physical security risks associated with integrating large loads onto the grid?  Which risks are unique to specific types of large loads (e.g., data centers, crypto mining, industrial loads)?  How is industry addressing cybersecurity and physical security risks posed by large loads?
5. How do utilities account for the interaction of behind-the-meter gas-fired generators compared to front-of-meter gas-fueled power generators on the same pipeline in planning and operations? 
6. Given the high load factor of data centers, what are utilities and RTOs/ISOs doing to ensure that resources used to meet capacity requirements have secure fuel sources to meet an increasingly flat load duration curve?

Speakers: 

• Jim Robb, President and Chief Executive Officer, North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC)
• Dr. Varun Sivaram, CEO and Founder, Emerald AI
• Bobby Olsen, Associate General Manager and Chief Power System Executive, Salt River Project (representing APPA/LPPC)
• Brian Starling, Director, Electric Transmission System Operations, Dominion Energy 
• Wayman Smith, Managing Director, Transmission Planning, American Electric Power (representing Edison Electric Institute)
• David Owens, President and Energy Consultant, Da’VAS (representing ESPX Global)
• Christopher Pilong, Sr. Director, Operations Planning, PJM Interconnection

12:00 pm      Lunch 

1:00 pm        Panel 2:  Reliability in the West Under Drought Conditions

The western United States is experiencing widespread drought, with over 65% of the region affected and significant water stress in the Colorado River Basin.  As long-term drought continues to intensify, the flow of water to reservoirs such as Lake Powell and Lake Mead from key tributaries in the river basin has fallen, with reservoirs now reaching critical elevations due to drought-related drops in overall precipitation, less snowpack, and earlier snowmelt.  These conditions threaten the availability of thousands of megawatts of electric generation and water supply reliability.  Given the complex interactions of risks across multiple industries and jurisdictions, this panel will explore long-range electric grid reliability issues associated with extended drought, declining snowpack and evolving hydrological conditions, and how planners and operators can identify and manage risks to minimize grid reliability concerns. 

This panel may include a discussion of the following topics and questions:  

1. There are estimates that it will take 8-10 years of good precipitation (rain and snowpack) to return reservoirs to adequate levels to support the 4,500 MW of Colorado River hydropower production, and such precipitation levels are not expected.  How are WECC and western utilities preparing to ensure reliability in the short-term and long-term for what appears to be a challenging future? 
2. How should resource adequacy planning models change in response to potential long-term reductions in inflows, minimum power pool constraints, and declining reservoir elevations that make hydropower an uncertain resource rather than a predictable seasonal asset? How have retirements of conventional generation combined with the addition of large loads affected this circumstance?
3. What is the most significant risk in reliability planning frameworks for the West (e.g., hydrological modeling, cross‑sector coordination, load forecasting, or extreme‑event assumptions) that could undermine near- and long-term reliability in the Western Interconnection?  How significant is this risk and how can it best be mitigated?
4. What structure is needed to enable coordinated decision making by water users and water rights holders (e.g., water managers, tribal nations, municipal utilities, agricultural users, and large industrial loads), who may not regularly interact and who would need to coordinate with grid operators to determine priority for health, safety and economic needs?  How are electric system operators aligning their operational and market planning cycles with water management and allocation decisions by the United States Bureau of Reclamation and state water authorities’ timelines for water releases, allocations, etc. that directly affect hydropower output?
5. How should planners better integrate rapidly shifting hydrological forecasts1 into multi‑year transmission, resource adequacy, and infrastructure planning processes, which traditionally assume stable water conditions?
6. How should WECC entities prepare for compounding reliability stress when hydropower shortages align with extreme heat, availability limitations for conventional generation resources due to cooling shortages, the retirement of conventional generation,reduced natural gas supplies due to limited freshwater for Gulf Coast refineries, and rapidly growing loads in the Southwest, creating simultaneous supply and demand pressures?  Are there datasets that operators lack today that would improve reliability operations and planning in the Colorado River Basin (e.g., real time tributary inflow telemetry, coordinated reservoir operations data, or cross-sector demand projections)?

Speakers: 

• Commissioner Ann Rendahl, Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission, and President, National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) 
• Jeff Droubay, President and CEO, Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC) 
• Nathalie Voisin, Chief Scientist, Regional Water-Energy Dynamics, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
• Chris Colson, Senior Vice President and Infrastructure Asset Management and Planning Manager, Western Area Power Administration (WAPA)  
• Michael Eugenis, Director, Resource Planning, Arizona Public Service
• Cody Allred, Water Resource and Fuel Quality Manager, PacifiCorp (representing National Hydropower Association) 

2:30 pm                  Closing Remarks 

2:40 pm                  End of Technical Conference

• 1Hydrological forecasts are predictions of future water‑cycle conditions such as river flows, reservoir inflows, snowpack levels, soil moisture, and runoff based on climate data, precipitation patterns, temperature trends, and watershed modeling.