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DOE Final POST Report on Outages

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Report of DOE’s Power Outage Study Team (POST) was released this morning.

“Findings and Recommendations to Enhance Reliability
from the Summer of 1999”

(This morning’s Wall Street Journal also broke the story.)

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REF: UFTO Note – DOE Power Outage Study
Date: Thu, 06 Jan 2000

The interim report was released in January, and a series of workshops were held around the country in the last week of January. Perhaps your company was represented.
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This final report makes summarizes workshop findings, and makes recommendations.

It is available (pdf acrobat) at: http://www.policy.energy.gov
or the POST webpage at: http://tis.eh.doe.gov/post/

(It should be there by the end of today.)

Printed copies of the can be obtained from the department’s Office of Public Inquiries by calling 202/586-5575.

—- DOE press release —————

March 13, 2000

Energy Department Issues Recommendations to Help Prevent Power Outages

Richardson Receives Power Outage Study Team Final Report

Energy Secretary Bill Richardson today received the department’s Power Outage Study Team final report on electricity outages and system disturbances during the summer of 1999. The report contains the team’s findings and recommendations of appropriate federal actions to help enhance electric reliability, and avoid the types of problems that occurred last summer.

“While demand for electricity is soaring along with the use of computers, fax machines and other appliances in our homes, offices and factories, the reliability of our electric grid is, at times, faltering, mainly because policy makers haven’t kept pace with rapid changes in the electric utility industry,” Secretary Richardson said. “But today’s report can be a blueprint for how we will work to keep the lights on and air conditioners running in America’s cities this summer.”

The report states that competition in the electricity industry can save customers money and help with improved reliability. The institutions and practices that provided reliable electric service in the past will need to change along with ongoing economic reforms.

The report makes the following 12 recommendations, each of which includes specific action items for federal consideration:

– Promoting market-based approaches to ensure reliable electric
services;
– Enabling customer participation in competitive electricity markets;
– Removing barriers to distributed energy resources;
– Supporting mandatory reliability standards for bulk-power systems;
– Supporting reporting and sharing of information on “best practices;”
– Enhancing emergency preparedness activities for low-probability,
high-consequence events on bulk-power systems;
– Demonstrating federal leadership through promotion of best
reliability practices at federal utilities;
– Conducting public-interest reliability-related research and
development consistent with the needs of a restructuring
electric industry;
– Facilitating and empowering regional solutions to the siting of
generation and transmission facilities;
– Promoting public awareness of electric reliability issues;
– Monitoring and assessing vulnerabilities to electric power
system reliability;
– Encouraging energy efficiency as a means for enhancing reliability.

“Federal electricity legislation is an essential component of the effort to help alleviate power outages this summer,” Secretary Richardson said. “Congress must move ahead to make changes in the federal statutory framework to provide the certainty that is needed to achieve reliable electric service in competitive wholesale and retail markets.”

Secretary Richardson formed the team, made up of power system experts from the Energy Department and its national research laboratories, as well as universities, following a series of power outages that crippled parts of New York City, Chicago and other communities across the nation during the past summer.

The final report follows an interim report issued in January that described events and findings on six power outages and two additional power disturbances. The team held three technical workshops across the country to invite comment and input on the appropriate federal role to help avoid future power outages. Over 150 individuals attended one or more of the workshops and over 70 entities submitted written comments.

DOE Power Outage Study

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Power Outage Study Team (POST) Releases Interim Report

Bill Richardson initiated this effort last summer, on the heels of the various outages around the country. The team was assembled during September and went through its paces, coordinated by Paul Carrier in DOE headquarters. There’s no direct connection to the CERTS effort, though many of the same people are involved. The press release below explains all the key elements. In particular, note the workshops later this month, and the availability of the interim report in hard copy and on line. The team’s website was turned on 2 days ago, and has all the information: http://tis.eh.doe.gov/post/

Contact: Paul Carrier, 202-586-5659, paul.carrier@hq.doe.gov

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DOE PRESS RELEASE January 4, 2000

Energy Department Team Examines Summer Outage Problems in the U.S. Electric Power System

Power Outage Study Team Releases Interim Report

U.S. Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson today received an Interim Report on the department’s investigation of the power outages and disturbances that occurred last summer. The high temperatures and heavy demand strained electric systems, affecting millions of people and businesses.

“The lessons that we learned as industry and government worked together preparing for the Y2K rollover were a good step toward achieving a more reliable electric grid,” Secretary Richardson said. “However, Congress needs to pass the administration’s electricity competition legislation in order to address many of the uncertainties that exist as the industry transitions to a new restructured environment.”

The investigation’s findings warn that while the electricity industry is undergoing fundamental change, the necessary operating practices, regulatory policies, and technological tools for dealing with those changes are not yet in place to assure an acceptable level of reliability. A significant increase in electricity use, especially during times of peak demand, is stressing the electric system.

The team of academics and departmental experts, formed last September as part of the Secretary’s six-point initiative to address electric reliability concerns, investigated outages in New York City, Long Island, New Jersey, the Delmarva (Delaware-Maryland-Virginia) Peninsula, Mississippi, Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, and Chicago, and non-outage disturbances in New England and the Mid-Atlantic States.

A final report, to be issued in March, will provide recommendations and will be followed by regional policy-level discussions across the country among industry leaders and federal, local and state government officials.

The team will be conducting a series of three technical workshops to obtain stakeholder input and comment on the Interim Report. The 38 findings detailed in the report have been grouped into five topical areas to facilitate discussion at the workshops. The workshop times, locations and primary topics are:

January 20
San Francisco, California
– Topic 1: Transition to Competitive Energy Service Markets (morning session)
– Topic 2: Regulatory Policy for Reliable Transmission and Distribution ( afternoon session)

January 25
New Orleans, Louisiana
– Topic 3: Information Resources (morning session)
– Topic 4: Operations Management and Emergency Response (afternoon session)

January 27
Newark, New Jersey
– Topic 5: Reliability Metrics, Planning, and Tracking

All interested parties are invited to register to participate in one or more of the workshops. A registration form is provided on the world wide web at http://tis.eh.doe.gov/post/.

The Interim Report is also available on that website. Printed copies of the report may be obtained from the Energy Department’s Public Reading Room at 202/586-3142.

Comments on the Report can also be submitted through January 31 via the Internet. These comments, as well as those received at the technical workshops, will help develop recommendations for the final report.