The Public Utility Commission of Texas is developing a pilot project to investigate how distributed energy resources can boost electric reliability with hopes to deliver a proposal to the state’s grid operator this fall, Commissioner Will McAdams said at the commission’s open meeting on Thursday.
“We're working aggressively,” McAdams said.
The project stems from an April memo filed by McAdams that identified nearly 3 GW of distributed generation resources on the Electric Reliability Council of Texas grid. Since then, the commission has opened a new docket for the aggregated distributed energy resource project.
It is part of the PUCT’s larger effort to ensure reliability in the wake of Winter Storm Uri and widespread blackouts last year.
“Initial workshops have been very productive,” McAdams said, adding that market participants, PUCT staff and ERCOT have all helped to “define the problem and set us on a path towards tangible solutions.”
Nominations for leadership roles on the project closed last week and McAdams said he anticipates “an active schedule over the coming weeks.” He hopes to present to the commission “the shape of the pilot project” by the Sept. 29 open meeting.
“At that point, at least we should have the bones in place to where we have something that ERCOT staff can hopefully refine and ultimately present to the ERCOT Board of Directors sometime in the fall, hopefully by the October meeting,” McAdams said.
