NERC Board Approves Vegetation Management Standard; Focuses on Four Pillars of Success

Dec. 13, 2011
The NERC board has approved the Project 2007-07 Vegetation Management (FAC-003-2), which is a results-based, foundational standard that provides a defense in-depth approach to vegetation inspections and minimum clearance distances.

The North American Electric Reliability Corp. (NERC) had its quarterly Board of Trustees meeting on Nov. 3 in Atlanta. NERC President and Chief Executive Officer Gerry Cauley welcomed NERC board members; Federal Energy Regulatory Commissioners John Norris and Cheryl LaFleur; and industry stakeholders.

In its fifth year as the electric reliability organization, NERC strives to build upon four pillars for continued success. Those foundations are:

  • Reliability – addressing real problems to improve the reliability of the grid.
  • Accountability – being accountable to customers, the industry and government for the performance of the grid.
  • Learning – enabling the industry to learn from experience to improve future reliability performance.
  • Risk-based model – focusing actions and programs on issues most important to grid reliability.

During this meeting, the board approved the Project 2007-07 Vegetation Management (FAC-003-2), which is a results-based, foundational standard that provides a defense in-depth approach to vegetation inspections and minimum clearance distances.

The board also approved the Reliability Standards Development Plan for 2012-2014, which addresses different aspects of standards prioritization; and two Rules of Procedure changes – Rules of Procedure Non-substantive Capitalization and Definition changes and Reinstatement of Section 402.1.3.2.

Three regional standards – Reactive Power Capability (MOD-025-RFC-1), Mitigation in the ERCOT Interconnection (IRO-006-TRE-1) and Automatic Underfrequency Load Shedding (PRC-006-SERC-1) – received approval as well.

In the Member Representative Committee meeting Nov. 2, the committee elected its officers for 2012: Scott Helyer of Tenaska Corporation as chair and Carol Chinn of American Transmission Company as vice-chair.

NERC’s next board meeting is Feb. 9 in Phoenix.

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