Department of Energy September 30, 2016 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Commission previously issued a 60-day Notice in the Federal Register (81 FR 38169, 6/13/2016) requesting public comments on FERC Form Nos. 6, 580, 1, 1-F, and 3-Q. The Commission received no comments regarding FERC Form Nos. 6 and 580 and issued a separate 30- day Notice on those collections (81 FR 62112, 9/8/2016). The Commission did receive comments (responding to the 60-day Notice) regarding FERC Form Nos. 1, 1-F, and 3-Q. This Notice addresses those comments and solicits additional comments on FERC Form Nos. 1, 1- F, and 3-Q. In compliance with the requirements of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, 44 U.S.C. 3507(a)(1)(D), the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (Commission or FERC) is submitting the FERC Form No. 1 (Annual Report of Major Electric Utilities, Licensees, and Others), FERC Form No. 1-F (Annual Report for Nonmajor Public Utilities and Licensees), and FERC Form No. 3-Q (Quarterly Financial Report of Electric Utilities, Licensees, and Natural Gas Companies) to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review of the information collection requirements. Any interested person may file comments directly with OMB and should address a copy of those comments to the Commission as explained below.

CWP Energy (Applicant or CWP Energy) has applied for authority to transmit electric energy from the United States to Mexico pursuant to section 202(e) of the Federal Power Act.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (Commission) approves Reliability Standard TPL-007-1 (Transmission System Planned Performance for Geomagnetic Disturbance Events). The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC), the Commission-certified Electric Reliability Organization, submitted Reliability Standard TPL-007-1 for Commission approval in response to a Commission directive in Order No. 779. Reliability Standard TPL-007-1 establishes requirements for certain registered entities to assess the vulnerability of their transmission systems to geomagnetic disturbance events (GMDs), which occur when the sun ejects charged particles that interact with and cause changes in the earth's magnetic fields. Applicable entities that do not meet certain performance requirements, based on the results of their vulnerability assessments, must develop a plan to achieve the performance requirements. In addition, the Commission directs NERC to develop modifications to Reliability Standard TPL-007-1: To modify the benchmark GMD event definition set forth in Attachment 1 of Reliability Standard TPL-007-1, as it pertains to the required GMD Vulnerability Assessments and transformer thermal impact assessments, so that the definition is not based solely on spatially-averaged data; to require the collection of necessary geomagnetically induced current monitoring and magnetometer data and to make such data publicly available; and to include a one-year deadline for the development of corrective action plans and two and four-year deadlines to complete mitigation actions involving non-hardware and hardware mitigation, respectively. The Commission also directs NERC to submit a work plan and, subsequently, one or more informational filings that address specific GMD-related research areas.