July 13, 2014

Representing electric co-ops nationwide, Georgia Transmission Corporation’s (GTC’s) Angie Sheffield spoke about bulk power system issues at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC’s) technical conference held to review grid reliability and North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) efforts.

NRECA’s Barry Lawson tapped Sheffield, GTC’s vice president, general auditor/chief regulatory compliance officer, to represent cooperatives at the meeting held in June. The commissioner-led panel included representatives from NERC, regional trade organizations (RTOs) and academia. The conferences, which are held annually, provide a means for FERC to stay abreast of developments related to electric reliability.

“It is important to ensure the commissioners hear the cooperative perspective,” said Sheffield. “FERC hears a lot from bigger entities such as the investor-owned utilities and electric reliability organizations. The cooperatives need representation to help prevent being disproportionately affected by regulations.”

Sheffield and others gave presentations on the status of NERC’s new risk-based compliance monitoring and enforcement, the effectiveness of events analysis in improving mandatory standards, and a discussion of emerging issues such as geomagnetic disturbance monitoring.

“I was happy to report NERC has made a lot of progress with a new risk-based monitoring approach and risk-based registration,” said Sheffield. “Recently approved changes to reduce requirements for smaller distribution cooperatives have been a big improvement. The number of electric distribution coops on the registry has been reduced from more than 100 to approximately 60. These changes are more reflective of the risks some of our cooperatives and other small companies pose to the grid.”

Sheffield reiterated that GTC continues to be a strong supporter of risk-based compliance monitoring and enforcement and appreciates the opportunity to provide input to NERC on reliability issues.

About Georgia Transmission Corporation
Georgia Transmission, a not-for-profit electric cooperative, owned by 38 Electric Membership Corporations (EMCs), owns more than 3,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines and more than 650 substations. These facilities deliver power to Georgia’s EMCs which serve nearly 50 percent of Georgia’s population (4.1 million).