Federal Power Act amendments focus on grid reliability

North Dakota's sole member of the U.S. House of Representatives, Republican freshman Congresswoman Julie Fedorchak, has introduced the Baseload Reliability Protection Act.

The bill aims to "amend the Federal Power Act to prohibit retirements of baseload electric generating units in any area that is served by a Regional Transmission Organization or an Independent System Operator and that the North American Electric Reliability Corporation [NERC] categorizes as at elevated risk or high risk of electricity supply shortfalls, and for other purposes."

A summary of the legislation is available on Fedorchak's House website.

Amendments: The Baseload Reliability Protection Act would amend the Federal Power Act in the following ways:

• It prohibits the retirement or conversion of critical dispatchable generators in areas identified by NERC as having an elevated reliability risk.
• It protects qualifying generators from penalties for noncompliance with environmental regulations, as under sec. 202(c) of the Federal Power Act.
• It provides exemptions when continued operation poses safety risks or is not economically viable.
• It allows the Department of Energy to offer grants and loans to generators needed for reliability to support necessary plant upgrades and extend operational life.
• It supports implementation of President Trump's executive order 14262 to keep reliable power plants running without adding costs to household electricity bills.

Sponsors: The legislation is cosponsored by several other Republican members of the House-August Pfluger, Randy Weber, and Craig Goldman from Texas; Troy Balderson and Michael Rulli from Ohio; Carol Miller from West Virginia; and Troy Downing from Montana.

Grid reliability: In February, Fedorchak spoke on the House floor to offer five solutions for the nation's "grid reliability crisis." In those remarks, she blamed the premature shutdown of reliable baseload power sources without dependable alternative sources of electricity in place as the primary driver of this crisis. In April, Fedorchak introduced a resolution to recognize "the urgent and growing