On September 14, 2020, two regional transmission organizations (RTOs), the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO) and Southwest Power Pool (SPP), announced a year-long transmission study to address historical challenges facing customers in areas where the RTO boundaries connect, known as seams, by identifying comprehensive, cost effective, and efficient upgrades.[1] Seams are the invisible boundaries between two RTO control areas, systems, and markets. The primary issue with seams is that there are inherent differences in how the RTOs create market rules or designs which leads to inefficiencies at the seams that prevent the economic transfer of capacity and energy between neighboring RTOs. One of the biggest issues this study seeks to address is the large amount of renewable energy that cannot be developed due to the issues inherent at seams.

The study will focus on solutions that MISO and SPP believe will offer benefits to both their transmission customers and end use consumers of RTO member companies. While the RTOs’ have a Joint Operating Agreement, which allows them to work through reliability issues, current processes do not include coordinated evaluation of benefits, or allocation of cost, to both load and interconnection customers. The study is expected to formally begin in December 2020 and will include several joint stakeholder meetings to provide updates on the findings. Any projects identified by the joint study will need to be approved by each RTOs’ respective Board of Directors before moving ahead.

[1] https://www.misoenergy.org/about/media-center/miso-and-spp-to-conduct-joint-study-targeting-interconnection-challenges/