by Richard Schulte, NERC Reliability Specialist

Recently, activity surrounding NERC standards has been very busy. FERC orders, changes in technology, and historical events are causing several NERC standards to be reviewed and revised to address the current conditions present today in our industry today. During the process of developing these new or revised standards, organizations have the opportunity to review the drafts and provide comments that are used to improve the standards.

NERC currently has 19 projects that are in formal development, 11 of which began in the last 18 months. Below are 4 of the projects that are a must-read, with a brief description of the project scope. Click on the link to go to the project page for details.

Project 2019-04 Modifications to PRC-005-6 NERC plans to modify NERC Standard PRC-005 to provide clarity that the BES protective functions enabled within analog/digital AVRs, excitation systems, and BES protective functions enabled within control systems that respond to measured BES electrical quantities and trip BES elements either directly or indirectly via lockout or auxiliary tripping relays are within the scope of the standard. The Standard Authorization Request also asks NERC to establish maintenance requirements for protection system DC supply technologies that are not currently covered.

Project 2021-08 Modifications to FAC-008 The project asks NERC to modify NERC Standard FAC-008 and any associated defined terms to:

• Clarify the term “Jointly Owned”, and what information is required to be shared with neighboring entities
• Permit inclusion of non-electrical equipment in the determination of GO facility Ratings (R1). (Explicitly allowing the inclusion of mechanical elements in facility ratings will ensure that Generators are rated to their most limiting element)

Project 2021-02 Modifications to VAR-002 The project seeks clarification in requirement 3 in regard to whether the Generator Operator of a dispersed power resource must notify their Transmission Operator of a status change of a voltage controlling device on an individual generating unit. Example, if a single inverter goes offline in a solar PV resource.

Project 2021-07 Extreme cold weather grid operations, preparedness, and coordination The project will remove the Generator Owner and Generator Operator requirements from NERC Standard EOP-011-2 and create a new NERC Standard EOP-012-1 Extreme Cold Weather Preparedness and Operations that will have 6 requirements for the Generator Owner and Generator Operator.

To view all Reliability Standards under development with NERC, follow this link to the Reliability Standards Under Development section at the NERC website.

The standards developed will be the standards that we will need to comply with in the future. Periodically reviewing the standards under development will give you an idea of the changes that are coming and the reason for the changes. This knowledge could be helpful in adjusting your program to maintain compliance.