September 02, 2003
September 2, 2003
LANSING – Governor Jennifer M. Granholm will ask Congress to immediately pass a stand-alone bill to provide mandatory, enforceable reliability standards for the nation’s electrical transmission system when she testifies before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce Wednesday.
“The August 14 blackout demonstrated the need for maintaining a safe, reliable, and efficient electronic transmission system in our nation,” Granholm said today. “While Michigan stands ready to help, the physical and legal nature of the transmission system requires a strong, coordinated, and immediate federal solution.”
Immediate mandatory reliability standards could mean giving more regulatory teeth to the North American Reliability Council (NERC) or to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). It could also mean putting a higher priority on making Regional Transmission Organizations (RTO) work effectively.
In addition to calling for the new reliability standards, Granholm will encourage Congress to include three basic criteria in any broader energy legislation: accountability, price predictability and stability, and investment in the power grid.
Granholm will explain that by adhering to such basic principles, Congress will help ensure that customers know who is responsible for what aspects of the electrical system which, in turn, paves the way for enforcing accountability.
Finally, the Governor will highlight the need to explore whether an evolving utility market might have impacted the power outage.
“There have been some positive results from deregulation and changes in Michigan law, but the restructuring of the market has made it much more difficult to determine who is responsible for ensuring reliability, and that is unacceptable,” Granholm said.
As a result of restructuring, the movement of power on the grid is controlled less directly by Michigan’s power companies and more widely influenced by the power supply and demand in the region.
“The average citizen is much less interested in pointing fingers and much more interested in knowing that when they get on an elevator, they are going to be able to get off; when they flip a switch, the lights will come on; or when they turn on the tap, the drinking water will flow,” Granholm said. “We must work to ensure that we’ve got a system that works right now.”
Granholm will be joined in Washington by Peter Lark, Chair of the Michigan Public Service Commission, who will also testify before the committee.
NOTE: Granholm is scheduled to testify before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce at 2:00 p.m. Wednesday, September 3, 2003, in the Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, D.C.
