JCSP Big Picture – who pays? WE DO!
July 2nd, 2013
Transmission — it’s all connected. In looking at the Minnesota rulemaking, and the existing and proposed rules that utilize the word “regional,” I’m thinking about big picture stuff, the big proposals in the wings, and that Joint Coordinated System Plan (JCSP) map sure presents a big picture. For some reason, I’ve not been able to find the full JCSP report until recently:
Who cares about JCSP? Well, WE’D better care, because look who’s paying for the transmission build-out (p. 68 of Vol. 1):
Look at the numbers for Midwest ISO, a $-10,293, or for MAPP, a $12,292, that’s a COST, not a savings. MISO and MAPP get nominal production cost savings and massive load COSTS. This is not news, but is worth repeating as we discuss “regional.” And another take with the same take-away of big costs for MISO and MAPP customers, used by our good friends at AWEA to promote this transmission buildout in their flyer called “Green Power Transmission and Consumer Savings” (flyer below):
Read the whole thing:
What a deal, eh?
Look what AWEA has been advocating to make this happen:
DUH… eastern states don’t want our transmission
March 5th, 2010
Repeat after me… EASTERN STATES DON’T WANT OUR MIDWEST TRANSMISSION.
Once more with feeling… EASTERN STATES DON’T WANT OUR MIDWEST TRANSMISSION!!!
And they don’t give a rodent’s rump what we do with our transmission but THEY DO NOT WANT TO PAY FOR IT!
It’s not anything new, but it seems that the message is getting through all the way to Iowa. Soon Minnesota? The message? That the east coast does not want Midwest transmission, that they have their own renewables and not only that, they know that transmission from the Midwest means coal and, most importantly, THEY WILL NOT PAY FOR TRANSMISSION FOISTED UPON THEM.
The 7th Circuit case tossing out PJM’s cost apportionment scheme must be having an impact because everyone is freakin’ about cost allocation. Again, GOOD! The court said that PJM could not shove the costs of transmission on those who do not benefit from it:
Enter the Coalition for Fair Transmission Policy, just launched today with a press conference in Washington, D.C.
Dig this from their site:
HA! I love it when that happens…
Here’s some background on our Midwest Transmission — transmission we don’t need and they don’t want:
This opposition to Midwest transmission is nothing new, I’ve entered documentation in the record in a couple of proceedings now, but what is new is that as of today’s “launch,” there’s now an industry group advocating against Midwest transmission, and that’s one utility interest I’m glad to see hopping mad as hell and not going to take it anymore! GOOD! Maybe that will help stop this stupid transmission-fest across the Midwest.
PUC Chair David Boyd had it right when he testified before Minnesota’s Legislative Energy Commission and led off with, “We need a business plan.” Yes, that’s true, there is no business plan, and there is no MARKET for transmission. I just hope that message gets through before “we” build and WE have to pay for all these wires in the air!
Here are a few recent posts of mine on this, followed by today’s article in the Des Moines Register.
And today’s Des Moines Register article:
By DAN PILLER • dpiller@dmreg.com • March 5, 2010
Alliant Energy has its objections
But as wind energy becomes bigger and more corporate, the utility industry is divided even in Iowa.
Other states have their own plans
While Iowa has speckled its countryside with wind turbines, other states have similar aspirations.
Atlantic seaboard states advanced plans for offshore wind farms, which they say would eliminate the need to ship wind-generated electricity from Iowa.
Read the rest of this entry »
Joint Coordinated System Plan
February 12th, 2009
With all these transmission proposals from hell announced, I think we’ve got to take a step backwards, and go through JCSP, the source of an insane “plan” for transmission across the U.S. JCSP is “Joint Coordinated System Plan,” which is MISO, PJM, SPP, TVA, and MAPP, getting together and fantacizing about transmission. This has nothing to do with need, with whether there’s a market, with whether it’s in the public interest, it’s what they want.
The NYT “Green Blog” had a post about this a couple of days ago that got this completely wrong, as you can see from the headline:
EARTH TO MARS — IT’S NOT FOR WIND.
Here’s a NYT “Green Blog” snippet with a look into the JCSP’smotivation (click for the whole thing):
The Joint Coordinated System Plan, as it is called, has been in development for months, according to the Midwest Independent System Operator, which is steering the project — and the full report will not be ready until the fall. But details of the plan were revealed on Monday in order to coincide with debate over the stimulus bill.
Yes, the stimulus bill. There’s a lot of money in that stimulus bill for transmission, and there’s NO money in the market for building transmission, or anything for that matter — remember, CapX 2020 was hustling Lehman Bros. for money, so it’s possible CapX won’t be built anytime soon. There they go to the government trough…
JCSP has it’s own site, just a contact form, with no contact information on it whatsoever, other than links to “the participants.”
Here’s their “plan” for transmission across the US:
So let’s see, we’ve got CapX 2020, MISO’s MTEP, the JCSP dream/nightmare plan, the Green Power Express… and they keep trying to couch their market dreams into wind, needed for RES. Can’t beople do a little background checking before they jump on this bandwagon? Can’t they do their due diligence like NYISO and ISO-NE?
DUH! There’s no market. This is such arrogance on the part of MISO…