NERC Urges Action to Boost Grid Stability Amid Summer Reliability Assessment
The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) has recently released its 2025 Summer Reliability Assessment, outlining potential vulnerabilities and offering recommendations to maintain grid stability. The assessment identifies several areas of concern, systemic challenges, and proposes specific actions to bolster reliability.
Several regional grids face heightened risk. The Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO) is flagged as a significant area of concern, while the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) continues to encounter ongoing challenges. The Pennsylvania-Jersey-Maryland Interconnection (PJM) demonstrates a high risk potential influenced by weather patterns and limitations in available resources. California's grid (CAISO) depends heavily on power imports and the performance of renewable energy sources for its reliability. Other regions, including New England’s reliance on non-firm power imports, the Southeast’s potential for outages and need for dependable fuel supplies, and Western States’ dependence on outside power during peak demand, also require careful monitoring.
Underlying these regional concerns are several systemic challenges. The increased integration of inverter-based resources (IBRs), such as solar PV and battery storage, presents new operational hurdles. Specifically, these resources are disconnecting during grid disturbances and current planning models often fail to accurately predict their behavior. The aging thermal generation fleet is also contributing to the problem, as older plants experience increasingly frequent forced outages. Consistent coordination between electric and natural gas operators remains critical, even with current adequate natural gas supply, and long-term supply chain constraints threaten future infrastructure development. A significant number of regions rely on non-firm imports, creating a vulnerability to disruptions.
To mitigate these risks, NERC offers several recommendations. Operational vigilance is paramount, requiring conservative outage coordination and proactive adjustments in preparation for extreme conditions. Early engagement with state and provincial regulators is needed to enable demand-side management initiatives. Improvements in resource performance are essential, particularly concerning IBRs – fully implementing existing recommendations and addressing model quality deficiencies. Account must be taken for higher forced outage rates from aging generation assets. Continued fuel coordination between electric and natural gas sectors remains vital. Establishing protocols for emergency generator usage during periods of high demand, and planning for potential Department of Energy emergency actions, are also recommended.
