But not for long (em as power producers and
customers get more creative in matching plants with loads Dynamic scheduling is a "sleeper" issue in the move toward electric competition. Industry players are debating independent system operators. They are focusing on issues of governance and the form of transmission pricing. Consequently, they are ignoring critical issues concerning ancillary services. These services are not receiving the attention they deserve.
Although electric utilities have used dynamic scheduling for at least two decades, it has taken this long to start growing in popularity and importance. This growth is a consequence of major changes under way in U.S. bulk-power markets, and, in particular, efforts to unbundle generation from transmission and increase competition among generation providers. It is an issue that will grow in importance over the next few years, primarily because of its potential to expand the geographic scope of competition in bulk-power markets.
Because of the growing importance of dynamic scheduling in bulk-power markets, we collected and analyzed data on utility experiences with this practice. We spoke with individuals from 32 investor-owned utilities, federal and state utilities, public power utilities and other regional and national entities about the following issues:
• Alternative definitions and applications of dynamic scheduling;
• Size of loads and generation that are dynamically scheduled;
• Any differences between dynamically scheduling loads vs. generation;
• Possible limits on the distance (or the number of intervening control areas) between the control area in which the load is located and the control area providing the generation services for that load (or by dynamically scheduled generation);