Director, Transmission & Security; Neil Rowland

Can you spare some change? I know I can!  I have change all around me, and I will be happy to share it with you.  Unfortunately it is not the type of change that jingles in your pocket, but the inevitable “things never stay the same” type of change.  The electric Utility industry is always changing, and keeping up with those changes is a big part of what KMEA does for its members.  The Southwest Power Pool (SPP) Regional Transmission Organization (RTO) is continuously updating its rules and regulations.

Those rules are kept in the SPP Tariff, a living document that would be out of date as soon as you finished printing it.

SPP has a group called the Regional Tariff Working Group (RTWG) that meets each month to review and approve changes to the Tariff made by other stakeholder groups and committee’s within the SPP. Stakeholder groups will submit a Tariff Revision Request (TRR) that details the planned change.  It is up to the legal team at SPP and the members on the RTWG to make the words fit the intent of the new change.

You could say it is Tariff-fying work, but in reality, it is important to review and look at planned changes from the Municipal point of view. Making sure that the new rules are fair and not burdensome or overly beneficial to any specific group of members is very important.

After the RTWG has finished its work the changes to the tariff are sent to the Markets and Operations Policy Committee (MOPC), a committee where each SPP members gets 1 vote, and then to the Board of Directors for their approval before they are submitted to FERC.

Because KMEA has an active member on the RTWG it can stay abreast of all the new changes that are coming out of the SPP member driven processes. Hopefully in the end that knowledge will allow all of us to better handle our change.