ICF study shows the national benefits of RTOs are too large to be ignored.
Lynne H. Church is the president of the Electric Power Supply Association. Before joining EPSA, she practiced energy law in Washington, D.C., after having served stints at Baltimore Gas & Electric Co. (as treasurer and assistant secretary) and at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (as associate general counsel for rulemaking and policy coordination).
Sixty billion dollars in benefits. Less than $6 billion in costs. In any business, those numbers mean just one thing: you've got a winner.
For the electric industry, these numbers demonstrate what many of us have been saying all along-regional transmission organizations (RTOs) are a winner.
Indeed, the numbers are so one-sided you might be tempted to think the study that produced them was jury-rigged by an interested party. Were the Electric Power Supply Association (EPSA) to commission such a study, for example, results of this magnitude likely would be dismissed out of hand by many as little more than thinly veiled advocacy. However, this study was commissioned by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) last fall, and conducted by an independent firm of high repute, ICF Consulting.