FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: March 13, 2024
CONTACT: Frances Owen | fowen@epsa.org
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The United States Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit recently issued a critical decision in defense of competitive market auction rules in the PJM DPL-South case.
The court ruled in favor of appeals from the Electric Power Supply Association (EPSA), the PJM Power Providers Group (P3), NRG Energy, and Constellation Energy Generation. It agreed with EPSA’s position that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) erred in approving a petition from PJM to retroactively revise the terms of a competitive power capacity auction after it identified an anomaly in its initial estimates.
EPSA represents competitive power suppliers owning more than 50,000 MW of generation capacity in PJM.
The court found definitively that PJM violated the Filed Rate Doctrine’s prohibition on retroactive rates when it attempted to change the structure of an auction held in December 2022 for capacity in the June 2024 – May 2025 period.
“EPSA is pleased that the Court so quickly and definitively resolved the questions raised here – that the filed rate doctrine bars FERC from changing auction rules after the fact. The importance of certainty cannot be overcome based on an arbitrary decision to change the outcome of an auction,” EPSA President and CEO Todd Snitchler said.
“Looking ahead, market operators would be well served to operate consistent with the tariff. If changes are needed, market operators should apply them prospectively as has been the practice for decades and as the filed rate doctrine requires. Doing so will only help to ensure participants’ confidence in the market’s operation,” Snitchler said.
The appeals court upheld the “unbending” filed rate doctrine, vacating FERC’s orders as applied to PJM’s 2024/2025 auction, going on to explain that it was “unconvinced by the contortions in FERC’s reasoning” which allowed for PJM to change auction rules retroactively.
###
The Electric Power Supply Association (EPSA) is the national trade association representing America’s competitive power suppliers. EPSA members provide about 150,000 MW of reliable and competitively priced electricity from environmentally responsible facilities using a diverse mix of fuels and technologies including natural gas, wind, solar, hydropower, geothermal, storage, biomass, and coal. EPSA seeks to bring the benefits of competition to all power customers. Learn more at www.epsa.org and connect with us on LinkedIn and X @EPSAnews.
