1
MAINE PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION
AUGUSTA, MAINE
IN RE: )
) Docket No. 2008-255
MAINE PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSION ) February 2, 2010
)
Petition for Finding of Public Convenience and Necessity for the Maine Power Reliability Program Consisting of the Construction of Approximately 350 Miles of 34.5 kV and 115 kV Transmission Lines (MPRP)
APPEARANCES:
JAMES BUCKLEY, Hearing Examiner
CHARLES COHEN, Maine Public Utilities Commission
SHARON REISHUS, Maine Public Utilities Commission
VENDEAN VAFIADES, Maine Public Utilities Commission
JOHN CASHMAN, Maine Public Utilities Commission
LISA FINK, Maine Public Utilities Commission
FAITH HUNTINGTON, Maine Public Utilities Commission
RALPH HOWE, Maine Public Utilities Commission
MICHAEL CANNATA, Maine Public Utilities Commission
ERIC BRYANT, Office of the Public Advocate
AGNES GORMLEY, Office of the Public Advocate
JARED DES ROSIERS, Pierce Atwood, Central Maine Power Company
ERIC STINNEFORD, Central Maine Power Company
HALLIE GILMAN, Central Maine Power Company
DAVID CONROY, Central Maine Power Company
RICK CONANT, RLC Engineering, Central Maine Power Company
GEORGE LOEHR, Central Maine Power Company
BRAD BORMAN, Bangor Hydro-Electric Company
ANDREW LANDRY, Preti Flaherty, IECG
TOBY DILWORTH, Drummond Woodsum, Andy and Janet King
ANDREW KING, Yarmouth Intervener
TOM WATSON, Yarmouth Intervener
WILLIAM FERDINAND, ISO-New England
KEVIN FLYNN, ISO-New England
BRENT OBERLIN, ISO-New England
STEPHEN ROURKE, ISO-New England
PETER BRANDIEN, ISO-New England
RICHARD SILVERMAN, GridSolar
MARK ISAACSON, GridSolar
GREG CUNNINGHAM, Conservation Law Foundation
MARY FOURNIER, Intervener
David FOURNIER, Intervener
CONFERENCE COMMENCED (February 2, 2010, 9:03 a.m.)
MR. BUCKLEY: Good morning. This is a hearing of the Public Utilities Commission in our case docket 2008-255, which is a case brought by Central Maine Power Company seeking authority to build a transmission project known as the MPRP. My name is James Buckley; I'm one of the Hearing Examiners on this case. Also with me on the bench this morning, on my immediate right are the three commissioners, Jack Cashman, Vendean Vafiades, and the chairperson Sharon Reishus in that order on my right. Next to Sharon is Chuck Cohen, another Hearing Examiner in this case. And next to Chuck is Faith Huntington, director of our electric and gas division. In the back tables are other members of the advisory staff team in this. Lisa Fink is behind Faith and Chuck, and Ralph Howe and our consultant, Mike Cannata is -- are behind me. Why don't we begin by starting with appearances this morning, starting with Central Maine Power Company?
MR. DES ROSIERS: Jared des Rosiers from Pierce Atwood on behalf of Central Maine Power.
MR. STINNEFORD: Eric Stinneford, Central Maine Power.
MR. CONROY: Dave Conroy, Central Maine Power.
MR. CONANT: Rick Conant, RLC Engineering on behalf of Central Maine Power.
MR. FERDINAND: Bill Ferdinand, Eaton Peabody on behalf of ISO-New England.
MR. FLYNN: Kevin Flynn, regulatory counsel with ISO-New England.
MR. ROURKE: Stephen Rourke with ISO-New England.
MR. OBERLIN: Brent Oberlin, ISO-New England.
MR. BRANDIEN: Pete Brandien, ISO-New England.
MR. ISAACSON: Mark Isaacson, GridSolar.
DR. SILKMAN: Rich Silkman with GridSolar.
MR. CUNNINGHAM: Greg Cunningham, the Conservation Law Foundation.
MS. GORMLEY: Agnes Gormley with the Office of the Public Advocate.
MR. BRYANT: And Eric Bryant with the Public Advocate.
MR. BUCKLEY: And the back table?
MR. DILWORTH: Toby Dilworth from Drummond Woodsum on behalf of Yarmouth interveners Janet and Andy King.
MR. WATSON: Tom Watson, Yarmouth intervener.
MR. KING: Andrew King, Yarmouth intervener.
MR. BORMAN: Brad Borman with Bangor Hydro-Electric Company.
MR. BUCKLEY: Okay. Are there people on the telebridge who'd like to enter an appearance because they might ask questions today?
MS. FOURNIER: Ah, yes, Jim, this is Mary Fournier, intervener.
MR. BUCKLEY: Okay.
MR. LOEHR: George Loehr on behalf of Central Maine Power.
MR. BUCKLEY: That was George Loehr on behalf of Central Maine Power?
MR. LOEHR: That's correct.
MR. BUCKLEY: Anyone else? Okay. Just like everyone did then, it's a good reminder to speak into the microphone. We are both recording these and it amplifies your voice for the people in the room and for the people listening on the telebridge, and people also might be listening on the internet. We are streaming at least when we're in public session. We will, of course, stop streaming if we have to go into confidential questioning.
With that, I think we're all set to deal with the first witness panel this morning which are the three ISO witnesses who just identified themselves. And perhaps they -- or ISO counsel can remind me, have these witnesses already been sworn in?
MR. FERDINAND: For technical conferences, yes.
MR. BUCKLEY: Okay, then I think that still holds today so we don't need to go through that. And I guess, Bill Ferdinand, are you the person to do the direct?
MR. FERDINAND: Yes.
MR. BUCKLEY: Okay.
MR. BUCKLEY: Good morning. We're going to have three witnesses right now so I'm going to talk to you as a group and you can answer individually if you need to. I'm handing you a document entitled Intervener Supporting and Rebuttal Testimony of ISO-New England, Inc. dated December 4, 2009. Do you want them to each identify the document or just one of them?
MR. BUCKLEY: Just one's fine.
MR. FERDINAND: Who's going to do the talking? Brent, can you identify the document, please?
MR. OBERLIN: It's entitled Intervener Supporting and Rebuttal Testimony of ISO-New England, Inc., December 4th, 2009, and that is our testimony.
MR. FERDINAND: And do you recognize that as your testimony filed in this case?
MR. OBERLIN: Yes.
MR. FERDINAND: Are there any corrections or errors in the testimony that you need to address at this time?
MR. OBERLIN: Yes, there are two. The first one occurs on page 40, line 11, the middle of the -- the last word of that sentence on that line. It says, "Load forecast over time." There should be a space between over and time, instead of one word which is currently in there.
MR. FERDINAND: Any other corrections?
MR. OBERLIN: And the second one is on page 41, line 16. You'll see that it says 1.79 percent for 50/50. The 50/50 should be replaced by 90/10. So that should read 1.79 percent for 90/10, 90 slash 10.
MR. FERDINAND: Okay, thank you.
MR. OBERLIN: And that is it.
MR. FERDINAND: With those corrections, do you adopt that as your testimony in this proceeding?
MR. OBERLIN: Yes.
MR. FERDINAND: Do you want answers from all of them or just one?
MR. BUCKLEY: I guess all of them since they're all offers of the testimony.
MR. ROURKE: Yes.
MR. BRANDIEN: And yes.
MR. FERDINAND: Thank you. I offer the testimony into evidence.
MR. BUCKLEY: Usually I wait to rule on that until after the cross examination so I'll do it in this instance too. And -- although you could hand it to the hearing reporter now.
MR. FERDINAND: I'm handing the CEII version and redacted version.
MR. BUCKLEY: I think just the -- just the confidential. These will be the real exhibits that will go into our record. And so the redacted is just for public access to our files.
MR. FERDINAND: Okay.
MR. BUCKLEY: We don't need an exhibit of a redacted version. Okay? As we discussed in the case management conference, the Public Advocate's going to go first.
MR. BRYANT: Thank you.
MS. VAFIADES: May I ask something first?
MR. BUCKLEY: Yes, you may.
MS. VAFIADES: Okay. Eric, is it all right with you if I ask a question just generally?
MR. BRYANT: Yeah.
MS. VAFIADES: Okay. Mr. Rourke, we received a copy of a January 29th letter from ISO-New England that was directed to Mr. Conroy at CMP that approves the project from ISO's perspective, and it has a figure on page two of roughly $1.375 million that's requested by CMP as properly categorized as pool-supported transmission facility. In other words it would be PTF?
MR. ROURKE: Yes.
MS. VAFIADES: Okay. And one of the things I just wanted to understand at the beginning so I can stay focused is it doesn't seem to me that all the components of the CMP request are included in a current approval by ISO-New England. So you don't need to go through the letter because I've read it and we all have it and thank you, but what I'd like to know is what isn't -- is there anything that was requested by CMP that has not been approved by ISO-New England for any reason? And if it hasn't, I'd like to know the reasons, please.
MR. ROURKE: Sure. Back when the application first came in, we were still doing an evaluation of the -- the design of Section 254. I believe that's a -- that's a line running up to Orrington. There's others here who could give you as much detail on that as you'd like. And at the time we were doing work on the TCA, it was not clear if the preferred way to go with that was to build it at 345 and operate it at 345, build it at 345 but operate it at 115 kV for some period of time, or to actually build it and operate it at 115. So that piece got carved out as -- as we went through while that work was going on. So that piece of the project in total is not factored into this determination. Everything else is, though.
MS. VAFIADES: So Section -- so for the purposes of the status of this hearing, Section 254 is not part of the reliability needs as determined by ISO-New England?
MR. ROURKE: No, it's not part of our finding for transmission cost allocation. It was certainly identified as part of the project and --
MS. VAFIADES: So it's only the status of -- so is it -- it's only the status of the line in terms of how the funding part would be treated?
MR. ROURKE: Yes.
MS. VAFIADES: But it is part of your analysis in terms of your overall reliability?
MR. ROURKE: Yes.
MS. VAFIADES: When will the decision be made about the resource aspect?
MR. OBERLIN: The ISO's work on Section 254 is done. I believe it's back to CMP to bring through the TCA process for that piece.
MS. VAFIADES: And what did you determine? I understand it's not binding because it hasn't gone through the process.
MR. OBERLIN: That the line only is required to be constructed and operated at 115 kV, but it does need to be a bundled conductor to reduce the impedance of the line.
MS. VAFIADES: So is it approved to be built at 345 but operate at 115 or just a 115 line? Maybe I didn't understand what you said. Go ahead.
MR. OBERLIN: The initial PPA had the line assumed constructed at 345 kV but operated at 115 kV. Our analysis following that showed that the line is not required to be built to 345 kV, that 115 kV would meet the need.
MS. VAFIADES: Thank you very much. Thank you, Eric. Sorry.
MR. BRYANT: Sure. I actually have a follow-up. I'm not sure I followed. I haven't read the letter. Has the ISO determined that Section 254 needs to be built but the cost of it cannot be socialized?
MR. ROURKE: No.
MR. BRYANT: Okay. Good. That was what I heard. All right, I was -- it was not my intent on behalf of the Commissioners to walk through any kind of preliminary planning procedures to bring you up to speed. I'm assuming you've -- you're familiar with that, but if you'd like me to do that, I can. I wasn't going to lay a lot of groundwork in other words.
MR. BUCKLEY: I don't think that's necessary --
MR. BRYANT: Okay.
MR. BUCKLEY: -- for the bench's benefit.
MR. BRYANT: Okay. Thanks. Also at the case conference my understanding was that CMP was going to have prepared a book of all the planning standards from NERC, NPCC, and ISO.
MR. DES ROSIERS: That's correct.
MR. BRYANT: Okay.
MR. DES ROSIERS: And we have -- we have them. We've distributed to the bench and they're available on the back of the --
MR. BRYANT: Okay. Because my first couple of questions actually are looking for quotes from those. So if we could turn to -- well, first -- my first question is this. I think this goes to Mr. Oberlin or perhaps Mr. Rourke. The NERC and NPCC set a variety of mandatory prescriptive planning criteria that you must follow, correct?
MR. ROURKE: Yes.
MR. BRYANT: Thank you. And there is some -- the ISO also publishes planning criteria. And I'd like you to turn, please, first, to PP3, Section 3, and I don't know what page that is in the massive set of plans you have. Section 3, called Area Transmission Requirements. Do you have that in front of you?
MR. ROURKE: Yes.
MR. BRYANT: I would like you to read the first sentence of the second paragraph, the one that begins "With due allowance for generator ...."
MR. OBERLIN: The first sentence of the second paragraph reads, "With due allowance for generator maintenance and force outages, design studies will assume power flow conditions with applicable transfers, load, and resource conditions that reasonably stress the system." I believe that's the one you're referring to.
MR. BRYANT: That is. Thank you. And the phrase "resource conditions," does that refer to generators and the use of generators in various dispatch scenarios when you're doing planning?
MR. OBERLIN: Yes.
MR. BRYANT: Thank you. Now I would like you, please to turn to PP5-3, Section 5.2. It's on page 17 of my version.
MR. OBERLIN: I'm sorry, you said 5.2?
MR. BRYANT: Correct. It's the section titled Reasonably Stressed Conditions.
MR. OBERLIN: Okay.
MR. BRYANT: And I'd like you to read the first sentence of that section, please.
MR. OBERLIN: "Reasonably stressed conditions are those ..." -- I'm sorry; let me start over. "Reasonably stressed conditions are those severe load and generation system conditions which have a reasonable probability of actually occurring."
MR. BRYANT: Thank you. So when doing transmission planning and arriving at a decision about whether a given dispatch scenario has, quote, "a reasonable probability of actually occurring," close quote, do planners consider the historic availability of generators?