Codes, Standards, Specifications, and Other Guidance for Enhancing the Resilience of Electric Infrastructure Systems Against Severe Weather Events, 32730-32731 [2019-14547]

Download as PDF 32730 Federal Register / Vol. 84, No. 131 / Tuesday, July 9, 2019 / Notices DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE Office of the Secretary [Docket ID: DOD–2019–OS–0085] Proposed Collection; Comment Request Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness, DoD. ACTION: Information collection notice. AGENCY: In compliance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness announces a proposed public information collection and seeks public comment on the provisions thereof. Comments are invited on: whether the proposed collection of information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of the agency, including whether the information shall have practical utility; the accuracy of the agency’s estimate of the burden of the proposed information collection; ways to enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information to be collected; and ways to minimize the burden of the information collection on respondents, including through the use of automated collection techniques or other forms of information technology. DATES: Consideration will be given to all comments received by September 9, 2019. SUMMARY: You may submit comments, identified by docket number and title, by any of the following methods: Federal eRulemaking Portal: https:// www.regulations.gov. Follow the instructions for submitting comments. Mail: Department of Defense, Office of the Chief Management Officer, Directorate for Oversight and Compliance, 4800 Mark Center Drive, Mailbox #24, Suite 08D09, Alexandria, VA 22350–1700. Instructions: All submissions received must include the agency name, docket number and title for this Federal Register document. The general policy for comments and other submissions from members of the public is to make these submissions available for public viewing on the internet at https:// www.regulations.gov as they are received without change, including any personal identifiers or contact information. khammond on DSKBBV9HB2PROD with NOTICES ADDRESSES: To request more information on this proposed information collection or to obtain a copy of the proposal and associated collection instruments, please write to the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness, Office of Legal Policy, 4000 Defense Pentagon, Washington, DC 20301–4000, ATTN: Monica Trucco, or call (703) 697–3387. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Title; Associated Form; and OMB Number: Application for the Review of Discharge or Dismissal from the Armed Forces of the United States; DD Form 293; OMB Control Number 0704–0004. Needs and Uses: This information collection is needed to provide Service members a method to present to their respective Military Department Discharge Review Boards their reason/ justification for a discharge upgrade, as well as, providing the Military Departments with the basic data need to process the appeal. Affected Public: Individuals or households. Annual Burden Hours: 5,000. Number of Respondents: 10,000. Responses per Respondent: 1. Annual Responses: 10,000. Average Burden per Response: 30 minutes. Frequency: As required. Dated: July 3, 2019. Aaron T. Siegel, Alternate OSD Federal Register Liaison Officer, Department of Defense. [FR Doc. 2019–14619 Filed 7–8–19; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 5001–06–P DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY Codes, Standards, Specifications, and Other Guidance for Enhancing the Resilience of Electric Infrastructure Systems Against Severe Weather Events Office of Electricity, Department of Energy (DOE). ACTION: Notice of request for information (RFI). AGENCY: Many investor- and consumer-owned electric utilities, as well as the state and local government agencies or boards that oversee or regulate them, are seeking cost-effective ways to make electric infrastructure systems more resilient against severe weather events, e.g., windstorms, floods, wildfires, etc. The purpose of this RFI is to gather ‘‘relevant consensus-based codes, specifications, and standards,’’ 1 state and industry best practices, and SUMMARY: FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: VerDate Sep<11>2014 17:47 Jul 08, 2019 Jkt 247001 1 The Disaster Recovery Reform Act, which was signed into law on October 5, 2018 as part of the FAA Reauthorization Act of 2018 (Pub. L. 115–254), includes several references ‘‘to relevant consensusbased codes, specifications, and standards,’’ including in sections 1234 and 1235. PO 00000 Frm 00032 Fmt 4703 Sfmt 4703 other pertinent materials to provide guidance for enhancing the physical and operational resilience of electric grid systems and their components, e.g., generation, transmission, control centers, and distribution facilities, against these events. Gathering this information will enable existing requirements and expert knowledge on this subject to be synthesized and made broadly available to interested policy officials and other decision-makers. In addition, this information may aid the Federal Emergency Management Agency in its implementation of the Disaster Recovery Reform Act of 2018, as well as other federal efforts to enhance resilience. Organizing existing knowledge in this way will also help identify important information gaps that can then be addressed through targeted research and development activities and through emergency preparedness actions by government agencies and the private sector. The U.S. Department of Energy also supports actions to enhance the weather-related resilience of other domestic forms of energy infrastructure, particularly oil and natural gas systems. A parallel RFI will be issued to gather analogous resilience information pertinent to those sectors. DATES: Comments must be received on or before August 23, 2019. ADDRESSES: Email: Interested persons are encouraged to submit comments electronically, to grid.resilience@ hq.doe.gov, with ‘‘Grid Resilience’’ in the subject line. Comments, data, and other information submitted to DOE electronically should be provided in PDF, Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, WordPerfect, or text (ASCII) file format. The information received in response to this RFI may be used to structure future DOE programs and will be available to the public. Respondents are strongly advised not to include any document or information that might be considered commercially- or business-sensitive, proprietary, confidential, critical electric infrastructure information, or classified for reasons of national security. Submissions should be written in English, be free of any defects or viruses, and without special characters or any form of encryption. U.S. Mail to: U.S. Department of Energy, 1000 Independence Ave. SW, Mailstop OE–20, Washington, DC 20585, Attn: Office of Electricity, Guidance for Enhancing Grid Resilience. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: David Meyer, U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Electricity, 1000 E:\FR\FM\09JYN1.SGM 09JYN1 khammond on DSKBBV9HB2PROD with NOTICES Federal Register / Vol. 84, No. 131 / Tuesday, July 9, 2019 / Notices Independence Avenue SW, Washington, DC 20585–0121. Telephone: (202) 586– 3876. Email: David.Meyer@hq.doe.gov. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Concern among government agencies, utilities, and the public about the risks presented by more frequent and more severe weather events has led to widespread discussion about how to make electric infrastructure systems more resilient against such hazards, and how to do so effectively and at reasonable cost. This is challenging to do, however, given the many uncertainties and variables associated with weather-related events. The specific purpose of this RFI is to gather available information on current consensus-based codes, specifications, standards, and other forms of guidance for improving the resilience of electric infrastructure systems against severe weather events, with respect to both the design and operation of these systems. The information of interest ranges from (1) specific technical design standards or requirements for physical system components, e.g., ‘‘transmission towers sited in areas subject to winds between 125 mph and 150 mph should be built to withstand wind stress of XYZ mph, using xxx-grade steel or yyy-grade concrete or both’’; (2) relevant corporate business practices, e.g., ‘‘companies should designate a senior corporate officer responsible for the development, implementation, and ongoing maintenance of a company-wide resilience strategy’’; and (3) analytic methods and tools for estimating the possible economic benefits from strategies, investments, or initiatives to enhance power system resilience. DOE anticipates using this information to catalogue and synthesize a body of existing expert knowledge about how best to enhance the weatherrelated resilience of the grid, costeffectively. Accordingly, it is important for respondents to supplement specific standards, requirements, or practices with the rationale(s) relied upon in developing them and justifying their use. DOE also notes that some of the existing electric reliability standards developed by the North American Electric Reliability Corporation and adopted by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and those developed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, have weather-related resilience implications and benefits. These standards are generally well-documented, and DOE suggests that respondents cite them where appropriate by reference only; submission of more detailed information is not needed. VerDate Sep<11>2014 17:47 Jul 08, 2019 Jkt 247001 Regarding state- or locally-adopted codes and standards that have resilience implications, or for less welldocumented requirements or practices, DOE has the following questions: (a) Scope and applicability—for any given requirement or practice, what hazard (or hazards) is the measure intended to mitigate or make the system less vulnerable against, and for which sector(s) or component(s) of the system is the practice relevant? Does the requirement establish a design threshold, e.g., ‘‘design to withstand 150 mph wind stress’’, or identify appropriate hazard maps, e.g., flood plain maps, or maps of wind zones? (b) Origins—how or by whom was the requirement or practice developed, and did the process provide for consensus, openness, transparency, balanced decision-making, due process, or an appeal process? Could the chosen development method be applied to unmet needs in other grid resilience contexts? (c) Validation—has the requirement or practice been widely tested? Note: DOE recognizes that worthwhile practices for improving resilience may exist that are not presently consensus-based, and therefore asks respondents to include information about such practices, and whether further testing or refinements would make them more broadly applicable. (d) Are there other important caveats, not mentioned earlier, about the requirement or practice that should be considered? Interested parties are encouraged to submit comments and information on matters discussed in this SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section, in writing and by the date specified in the DATES section of this notice. All comments received will be posted without change to https:// www.regulations.gov. Please do not submit to the RFI information for which disclosure is restricted by statute, such as trade secrets and confidential commercial or financial information (Confidential Business Information (CBI)). Comments submitted to the RFI email address cannot be claimed as CBI, and submission waives any such claims. DOE plans to make all information received in response to this RFI available to the public. Signed in Washington, DC, on June 28, 2019. Bruce J. Walker, Assistant Secretary, Office of Electricity, U.S. Department of Energy. [FR Doc. 2019–14547 Filed 7–8–19; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 6450–01–P PO 00000 Frm 00033 Fmt 4703 Sfmt 4703 32731 DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY Codes, Standards, Specifications, and Other Guidance for Enhancing the Resilience of Oil and Natural Gas Infrastructure Systems Against Severe Weather Events Office of Electricity, Department of Energy (DOE). ACTION: Notice of request for information (RFI). AGENCY: Many oil and natural gas companies, pipeline operators, fuel distribution and delivery firms, and other owners and operators of oil and natural gas infrastructure, as well as the government agencies that regulate them in some respect, are seeking costeffective ways to make these infrastructure systems more resilient against cyber and physical threats as well as severe weather events. The purpose of this RFI is to gather ‘‘relevant consensus-based codes, specifications, and standards’’ 1 and other pertinent materials to provide guidance for enhancing the physical and operational resilience of these systems and their components against such events. Gathering this information will enable existing expert knowledge on this subject to be synthesized and made broadly available to interested policy officials and other decision-makers. In addition, this information may aid the Federal Emergency Management Agency in its implementation of the Disaster Recovery Reform Act of 2018, as well as other federal efforts to enhance resilience. Organizing existing knowledge in this way will also help identify important information gaps that can then be addressed through targeted research and development activities and through emergency preparedness actions by government agencies and the private sector. The U.S. Department of Energy also supports actions to enhance the weather-related resilience of other domestic energy infrastructure, particularly electric grids. A parallel RFI will be issued to gather analogous resilience information pertinent to the electric sector. DATES: Comments must be received on or before August 23, 2019. ADDRESSES: Email: Interested persons are encouraged to submit comments electronically, to SUMMARY: 1 The Disaster Recovery Reform Act, which was signed into law on October 5, 2018 as part of the FAA Reauthorization Act of 2018 (Pub. L. 115–254), includes several references ‘‘to relevant consensusbased codes, specifications, and standards,’’ including in sections 1234 and 1235. E:\FR\FM\09JYN1.SGM 09JYN1

Agencies

[Federal Register Volume 84, Number 131 (Tuesday, July 9, 2019)]
[Notices]
[Pages 32730-32731]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2019-14547]


=======================================================================
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DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY


Codes, Standards, Specifications, and Other Guidance for 
Enhancing the Resilience of Electric Infrastructure Systems Against 
Severe Weather Events

AGENCY: Office of Electricity, Department of Energy (DOE).

ACTION: Notice of request for information (RFI).

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

SUMMARY: Many investor- and consumer-owned electric utilities, as well 
as the state and local government agencies or boards that oversee or 
regulate them, are seeking cost-effective ways to make electric 
infrastructure systems more resilient against severe weather events, 
e.g., windstorms, floods, wildfires, etc. The purpose of this RFI is to 
gather ``relevant consensus-based codes, specifications, and 
standards,'' \1\ state and industry best practices, and other pertinent 
materials to provide guidance for enhancing the physical and 
operational resilience of electric grid systems and their components, 
e.g., generation, transmission, control centers, and distribution 
facilities, against these events. Gathering this information will 
enable existing requirements and expert knowledge on this subject to be 
synthesized and made broadly available to interested policy officials 
and other decision-makers. In addition, this information may aid the 
Federal Emergency Management Agency in its implementation of the 
Disaster Recovery Reform Act of 2018, as well as other federal efforts 
to enhance resilience. Organizing existing knowledge in this way will 
also help identify important information gaps that can then be 
addressed through targeted research and development activities and 
through emergency preparedness actions by government agencies and the 
private sector.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

    \1\ The Disaster Recovery Reform Act, which was signed into law 
on October 5, 2018 as part of the FAA Reauthorization Act of 2018 
(Pub. L. 115-254), includes several references ``to relevant 
consensus-based codes, specifications, and standards,'' including in 
sections 1234 and 1235.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

    The U.S. Department of Energy also supports actions to enhance the 
weather-related resilience of other domestic forms of energy 
infrastructure, particularly oil and natural gas systems. A parallel 
RFI will be issued to gather analogous resilience information pertinent 
to those sectors.

DATES: Comments must be received on or before August 23, 2019.

ADDRESSES: 
    Email: Interested persons are encouraged to submit comments 
electronically, to [email protected], with ``Grid Resilience'' 
in the subject line. Comments, data, and other information submitted to 
DOE electronically should be provided in PDF, Microsoft Word, Microsoft 
Excel, WordPerfect, or text (ASCII) file format. The information 
received in response to this RFI may be used to structure future DOE 
programs and will be available to the public. Respondents are strongly 
advised not to include any document or information that might be 
considered commercially- or business-sensitive, proprietary, 
confidential, critical electric infrastructure information, or 
classified for reasons of national security. Submissions should be 
written in English, be free of any defects or viruses, and without 
special characters or any form of encryption.
    U.S. Mail to: U.S. Department of Energy, 1000 Independence Ave. SW, 
Mailstop OE-20, Washington, DC 20585, Attn: Office of Electricity, 
Guidance for Enhancing Grid Resilience.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: David Meyer, U.S. Department of 
Energy, Office of Electricity, 1000

[[Page 32731]]

Independence Avenue SW, Washington, DC 20585-0121. Telephone: (202) 
586-3876. Email: [email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Concern among government agencies, 
utilities, and the public about the risks presented by more frequent 
and more severe weather events has led to widespread discussion about 
how to make electric infrastructure systems more resilient against such 
hazards, and how to do so effectively and at reasonable cost. This is 
challenging to do, however, given the many uncertainties and variables 
associated with weather-related events.
    The specific purpose of this RFI is to gather available information 
on current consensus-based codes, specifications, standards, and other 
forms of guidance for improving the resilience of electric 
infrastructure systems against severe weather events, with respect to 
both the design and operation of these systems. The information of 
interest ranges from (1) specific technical design standards or 
requirements for physical system components, e.g., ``transmission 
towers sited in areas subject to winds between 125 mph and 150 mph 
should be built to withstand wind stress of XYZ mph, using xxx-grade 
steel or yyy-grade concrete or both''; (2) relevant corporate business 
practices, e.g., ``companies should designate a senior corporate 
officer responsible for the development, implementation, and ongoing 
maintenance of a company-wide resilience strategy''; and (3) analytic 
methods and tools for estimating the possible economic benefits from 
strategies, investments, or initiatives to enhance power system 
resilience.
    DOE anticipates using this information to catalogue and synthesize 
a body of existing expert knowledge about how best to enhance the 
weather-related resilience of the grid, cost-effectively. Accordingly, 
it is important for respondents to supplement specific standards, 
requirements, or practices with the rationale(s) relied upon in 
developing them and justifying their use.
    DOE also notes that some of the existing electric reliability 
standards developed by the North American Electric Reliability 
Corporation and adopted by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, 
and those developed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics 
Engineers, have weather-related resilience implications and benefits. 
These standards are generally well-documented, and DOE suggests that 
respondents cite them where appropriate by reference only; submission 
of more detailed information is not needed.
    Regarding state- or locally-adopted codes and standards that have 
resilience implications, or for less well-documented requirements or 
practices, DOE has the following questions:
    (a) Scope and applicability--for any given requirement or practice, 
what hazard (or hazards) is the measure intended to mitigate or make 
the system less vulnerable against, and for which sector(s) or 
component(s) of the system is the practice relevant? Does the 
requirement establish a design threshold, e.g., ``design to withstand 
150 mph wind stress'', or identify appropriate hazard maps, e.g., flood 
plain maps, or maps of wind zones?
    (b) Origins--how or by whom was the requirement or practice 
developed, and did the process provide for consensus, openness, 
transparency, balanced decision-making, due process, or an appeal 
process? Could the chosen development method be applied to unmet needs 
in other grid resilience contexts?
    (c) Validation--has the requirement or practice been widely tested? 
Note: DOE recognizes that worthwhile practices for improving resilience 
may exist that are not presently consensus-based, and therefore asks 
respondents to include information about such practices, and whether 
further testing or refinements would make them more broadly applicable.
    (d) Are there other important caveats, not mentioned earlier, about 
the requirement or practice that should be considered?
    Interested parties are encouraged to submit comments and 
information on matters discussed in this SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION 
section, in writing and by the date specified in the DATES section of 
this notice. All comments received will be posted without change to 
https://www.regulations.gov.
    Please do not submit to the RFI information for which disclosure is 
restricted by statute, such as trade secrets and confidential 
commercial or financial information (Confidential Business Information 
(CBI)). Comments submitted to the RFI email address cannot be claimed 
as CBI, and submission waives any such claims. DOE plans to make all 
information received in response to this RFI available to the public.

    Signed in Washington, DC, on June 28, 2019.
Bruce J. Walker,
Assistant Secretary, Office of Electricity, U.S. Department of Energy.
[FR Doc. 2019-14547 Filed 7-8-19; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 6450-01-P
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