Market Technical Analysis for the iMarket Meter Data Management System

Based on recent success with Swift’s iMarket Meter Data Management System (MDMS) product in the Southwest Power Pool (SPP), additional wholesale energy markets need to be analyzed to determine the feasibility of marketing and selling the MDMS product in those markets. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) is promoting the voluntary formation of Regional Transmission Organizations (RTO). One goal of a RTO is to promote efficiency in wholesale electric markets to provide the lowest price possible for reliable electric service . The Commission’s policy with regard to RTOs is contained in Order 2000. Throughout the United States, RTOs have been formed or are being formed to comply with FERC’s RTO requirements. The SPP has recently been granted RTO status by FERC. SPP is currently implementing a wholesale electric market for its member utilities and other non-member utilities that plan to sell energy into the SPP market. There are currently ten other established and proposed RTOs in North America that are comprised of member utilities that are required to submit meter data to support the market’s settlement processes. Every utility that is participating in a wholesale electric market is a potential customer for the MDMS product. The number of member utilities for each RTO varies from eight to over 300. The MDMS product’s core functionality is to format meter data to an RTO specific format and submit it programmatically to the RTO for the RTO’s settlement processes. Each of these RTO markets has been analyzed for the future expansion of marketing and sales of the MDMS product to members of each RTO. Key criteria in the analysis are the age of the market and the technical requirements for formatting meter data and submitting it programmatically. For reference, the RTO and proposed RTO regions are displayed on the following FERC map. Note that time constraints prevented any in depth analysis of the Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO) and the New York Independent System Operator (NYISO)