FERC Grants NERC Enforcement Discretion Over Low-Risk Violations

In a move intended to improve the efficiency of the Reliability Standard violation enforcement process, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC or the Commission) yesterday approved the North American Electric Reliability Corporation's (NERC's) "Find, Fix & Track" (FFT) enforcement proposal.¹ The FFT process should provide NERC and the Regional Entities with increased flexibility to address low-risk Reliability Standard violations, avoiding the need for a lengthy settlement process for minor violations that pose little risk to bulk-power system reliability. While NERC will continue to report all violations, this change will eliminate—for those low-risk violations selected for FFT treatment—the extensive mitigation and settlement paperwork that historically accompanied minor violations. Despite this increased flexibility for NERC and the Regional Entities, the Commission promised strict oversight of this process.