Largest US grid operator opposes plan to save coal, nuclear plants

Bloomberg

The biggest US grid operator is asking regulators to reject
Energy Secretary Rick Perry’s plan to prop up ailing coal and nuclear plants.
“I don’t know how this proposal could be implemented without a detrimental impact on the market,” Andrew Ott, who heads up PJM Interconnection LLC, told reporters by phone. Perry’s proposal is “discriminatory” and inconsistent with federal law, Ott said.
In response to rising retirements in PJM and elsewhere, Perry had asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to change the way that wholesale power markets price electricity so that certain coal and nuclear generators can recover their costs. The plan has drawn fire from a wide coalition of natural gas producers, renewable energy generators, and public utilities, which argue that such an approach would distort markets, inhibit competition and raise consumer prices.
PJM, which spans more than a dozen states from the Midwest to the Mid-Atlantic and serves more than 65 million people, stands to be shaken up the most by the plan, which aims to reward plants capable of storing 90 days of fuel
supplies at their sites.
Coal accounts for one-third of electricity generation in PJM, which retired more than 19 gigawatts of coal-fired power between 2011 and 2016. The rule appears to target PJM specifically, Ott said. Nevertheless, “the PJM market is more diverse and reliable today than we’ve seen,” he said.
His remarks echo concerns raised by other grid operators, which on Monday asked the commission to reject Perry’s proposal.