Yes! I’m familiar with Bruce’s work, and I think a lot of us agree that price formation and price-based automation are important and now even more feasible at all scales from the individual household up to the large load customer.
Great article, Lynne! "These institutions are non-replicable — no competing alternative can simply be constructed — meaning that the rules defining who participates, on what terms, and bearing what obligations become the primary margin of institutional adaptation rather than competitive pressure from outside." Really profound.
After 2021's Storm Uri, there were calls for ERCOT to get a capacity market - like PJM's. I'm interested to hear your thoughts on what PJM reformers can learn from 2026 ERCOT. (For example, has demand response increased so much there that fears of another Uri-like situation are unwarranted?)
Thanks Robin! I think PJM can learn a lot from ERCOT, and the most straightforward and fundamental are about the price cap. Right now ERCOT is also doing some good work developing controllable load resources (CLRs) and provisions for dispatching load in SCED on the demand side. That’s where I’d like to see things go, and I don’t think the split regulatory jurisdiction in PJM that ERCOT lacks is an appreciable hurdle given that FERC has often seemed to want to push more toward active demand participation than the RTO partners do.
It is a hopeful sign that these ideas are getting much wider play. In case you missed it, a recent Volts podcast centered on pricing as being better than VPPs for distributed energy resources: https://open.spotify.com/episode/0U0eZ0VBnBuuiDmaqXrWe7?si=A0-FmrndRASwEaVspV3ASg
Yes! I’m familiar with Bruce’s work, and I think a lot of us agree that price formation and price-based automation are important and now even more feasible at all scales from the individual household up to the large load customer.
Imagine the reactions of Zhang Zhigang, State Grid’s CEO, reading this summary.
Everyone who attended the PJM annual meeting including the FERC chair should read this discussion right now!
Great article, Lynne! "These institutions are non-replicable — no competing alternative can simply be constructed — meaning that the rules defining who participates, on what terms, and bearing what obligations become the primary margin of institutional adaptation rather than competitive pressure from outside." Really profound.
After 2021's Storm Uri, there were calls for ERCOT to get a capacity market - like PJM's. I'm interested to hear your thoughts on what PJM reformers can learn from 2026 ERCOT. (For example, has demand response increased so much there that fears of another Uri-like situation are unwarranted?)
Thanks Robin! I think PJM can learn a lot from ERCOT, and the most straightforward and fundamental are about the price cap. Right now ERCOT is also doing some good work developing controllable load resources (CLRs) and provisions for dispatching load in SCED on the demand side. That’s where I’d like to see things go, and I don’t think the split regulatory jurisdiction in PJM that ERCOT lacks is an appreciable hurdle given that FERC has often seemed to want to push more toward active demand participation than the RTO partners do.