Duquesne Light Company's Default Service Plan

GEN 00001

Question: Do you anticipate any changes in Black Start revenue requirements for the Duquesne service zone?

Answer: Duquesne Light advises potential wholesale suppliers to review all the projected billing line items that will be the responsibility of the supplier.  The Company wants to ensure the projected Black Start zonal revenue requirements for the Duquesne Light zone are considered in any 1 and 2 year offers being made by a supplier.    

GEN 00002

Question: Could you please clarify: if a qualified bidder is currently not serving any small commercial load, are they eligible to bid on a total of 4 small commercial blocks in the March 2017 auction? They would not exceed 50% load share in this case.

Answer: The load cap for Small C&I is 2 tranches.  No bidder can bid on or win more than 2 tranches of the Small C&I products.  Some bidders may have additional restrictions depending on the load currently served.

GEN 00003

Question: What is the Reactive Supply Requirement for Duequesne Zone?

Answer: Please refer to the PJM OATT Schedule 2, Manual 27, Section 3 for more information on the billing Charges and Credits.  The PJM website titled "Billing, Settlements, and Credits" is also a helpful too.

PJM state of the market report, section 10, has some aggregate and DLC specific information.

http://www.monitoringanalytics.com/reports/PJM_State_of_the_Market/2016/2016-som-pjm-volume2-sec10.pdf

GEN 00004

Question: Can you give us the ARR paths that were selected for the ARR nomination at PJM.

Answer:

Stage 2 Round 2 of the 2017/2018 Annual ARR Allocation opened today on Monday, March 20, 2017, and will close at 1700 on Tuesday, March 21, 2017.  The results will not be available until 1700 on Friday, March 24, 2017. 

GEN 00005

Question: Do you know of any Municipal Aggregation activity going on in the Duquesne Zone?

Answer: There are no Municipal Aggregation activities that will impact any of the default service load.

GEN 00006

Question: News media outlets have reported that Pennsylvania regulators are considering a change in the PA Solar RPS that would prohibit the use of out-of-state projects to meet new, aggressive solar targets. Can you explain whether these changes may be adopted without legislation, and whether any resulting change in the price or quantity of required SRECs would be borne by suppliers?

Answer: Duquesne cannot speculate on pending legislative action.  Any requirement that changes the price or quantity of SRECs would be borne by the suppliers.

GEN 00007

Question: Can you clarify how code 1952, Deferred Tax Adjustment, is a charge is handled between the EDU and the Default Service Supplier? It appears that Accumulated Deferred Income Tax is currently collected by Duquesne as part of the Distribution System Improvement Charge.

Answer: The wholesale providers that serve load will not see the Deferred Tax Adjustments on the PJM invoice. That line item is not assigned to wholesale suppliers that are serving load and it will not appear on their PJM invoice.  From a POLR or default service, perspective, Duquesne Light remains the LSE. Duquesne procures the supply needed to serve customers but remains the LSE. Customers themselves are not transferred to the wholesale suppliers. As a result, Duquesne Light remains responsible for the Deferred Tax Adjustment.

GEN 00008

Question: Will Duquesne continue with the ARR selection process for this year rather than turning over the last round to winning suppliers?

Answer: Yes.  Duquesne Light will continue the ARR selection process and complete it throughout the term.  The results of the selections will be shared.  The ARR's will be transferred upon completion and prior to the June start. 

GEN 00009

Question: What is the impact of recent changes in Duquesne's reactive service charges?

Answer: In the past, Duquesne Light's POLR providers were charged a PJM average tariff related to reactive supply.  Effective March 2018, the reactive costs align the charges more closely with actual costs in Duquesne's territory.  The current reactive costs are lower than they had been when it was a system wide average cost.  Please refer to the PJM Website for more information on reactive charges.

GEN 00010

Question: FERC issued an order on EL05-121 that impacts charges and credits to certain billing line items from PJM. What will the impact be for POLR suppliers?

Answer: This order will result in changes to PJM line items 1108 and 1115. However, Duquesne suppliers will not see any of these changes on tehir invoices from PJM related to their supplire share of Duquesne's POLR load.  All EL05-121 related credits and charges are internal to Duquesne Light since they are considered transmission related.

GEN 00011

Question: Will there be any AEC credits provided for the December 2018 MC&I Auction?

Answer: AEC credits will not be provided by Duquesne Light Company for the December 2018 MC&I Auction.  Duquesne Light Company will request suppliers transfer their AEC requirements in accordance with the schedule in item (2) of Appendix E - DS Supplier's Obligations for AEPS Compliance of the Supply Master Agreement.

GEN 00012

Question: Can you detail the math employed to transform PJM Settlement-level load to Retail-level load as used in the calculation of a supplier's AEC requirement? As I understand the matter, Retail-level load can be calculated as (PJM Settlement-level load) / (1- Deration Factor) / (1+ Distribution Loss Factor + Transmission Loss Factor). Can you confirm?

Answer: Duquesne calculates the retail load using the settlement load without a deration factor applied minus the line losses and UFE.

GEN 00013

Question: Notice to participants regarding the reclassification of C&I customers starting with the June 1, 2019 delivery period:

Answer: On May 2, 2016, Duquesne Light Company filed a petition for approval of their DSP-VIII Default Service Program with the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission under Docket No. P-2016-2543140. The approved DSP-VIII included a provision that set the threshold for customers to qualify under the hourly priced product (Large C&I) at 300 kW. That threshold was set to decline from 300 to 200 kW starting with the June 1, 2019 delivery period. As a result, certain customers qualifying under the lower threshold will be classified as Large C&I starting with the March 2019 supply auction. Reclassified customers taking service as Large C&I will continue to take service under the same distribution rate class as they did when classified as Medium C&I customers.

GEN 00015

Question: Can you give us the ARR paths, associated with Medium C& I, that were awarded by PJM for PY 19/20?

Answer: All ARRs are awarded by zone or aggregate (e.g. sinking in a zone/aggregate), so it is not possible to tell the load a specific path is associated with beyond a zonal or aggregate level.

GEN 00016

Question: For DSP-VIII, Default Service Load will be divided into identical units called tranches, each representing a defined percentage of Default Service Load. For example, if there are 25 tranches for a given customer class, then each tranche equals 1/25 = 0.04 = 4%, or four percent of that class’s load. For the March 2020 Auction. There are 12 Tranches of Residential available that make up 25% of the total load. Using the example above 1 tranche would equal 1/12 = .0833 or 8.33%. However, since this only represents 25% of the total load. the total number of tranches would be 48, so it would be 1/48 which equal .0208 or 2.08. Which is the correct answer?

Answer: 25% of the load correspond to 12 tranches, so 1 tranche is (25%)/12 = 2.0833% of the load. 

The load is divided in 48 tranches, so each tranche is (100%)/48 = 2.0833% of the load.

GEN 00017

Question: Is there something wrong with the 2019 SCI historical data (POLR + EGS)? When you compare it all the historical years it is the highest. For example, Jan 2019 is the higher than Jan 2011, Jan 2012, Jan 2013, Jan 2014, Jan 2015, Jan 2016, Jan 2017 and Jan 2018. Same goes for February 2019, March 2019, April 2019, May 2019, June 2019, July 2019, August 2019, Sept 2019 and Oct 2019. And it is higher than any other historcal year by 10% to 20%

Answer: The observed pattern is most likely the result of rate class changes for accounts that occur at the beginning of the year.  

GEN 00022

Question: In the current Historic PLC – NSPL Data - Large C&I file, can you clarify which loads are served under the Large Commercial and Industrial Class Hourly Price Transaction? In some classes, the POLR PLC (5CP MW-DAY) and NSPL (1CP MW-DAY) values are considerably larger than the historical load data. As an example, the HVPS value starting 10/31/2019 is 32.4 MW, while the load maxes out at 0.4 MW on February 9, 2020. For all other classes, the PLC and NSPL values are somewhat comparable to usage. If the PLC data is correct, then is the hourly load data in the Hourly Loads 2015-2019 - Large C&I (HPS) file incorrect?

Answer: HVPS POLR had only one customer with usage in February 2020. This POLR customer had the HVPS rate class assigned to them based on anticipated future usage and was a relatively new account. The HVPS 5CP and 1CP cited for October 2019  was calculated for usage in June 2018 to Sep 2018 when there were more POLR customers on HVPS. HVPS is very volatile.

GEN 00023

Question: On slide 11 of the Bidder Information Session presentation, you state that "There are ongoing discussions at the PA Commission related to PA Act 40 and that may affect the solar SREC requirements for suppliers." Could you please clarify what the nature of these discussions are? Is this with respect to Senate Bill 600, which was introduced in the Pennsylvania General Assembly in 2019?

Answer: The Final Implementation Order for Act 40 was adopted April 19, 2018 and is available at http://www.puc.state.pa.us/pcdocs/1565100.docx.

There were a few suppliers who filed petitions for reconsideration in regards to the Act 40 Final Implementation Order. However, the Commission issued an Order August 2, 2018 regarding those petitions (http://www.puc.state.pa.us/pcdocs/1579428.doc). DLC  is not aware of outstanding issues related to Act 40.

GEN 00024

Question: Does the definition of PLC vary across the MCI and SCI customers? I've noticed that, in the context of the January reclassification between SCI and MCI customers, the eligible counts seem to be moved from one customer class to another, but the PLCs don't. They can be very different. For example, from Dec 19 to Jan 20, eligible counts for SCI change +1,936, while MCI -2,010, which is very close. However, for the same period, the change in eligible PLC for SCI was +7.66 MW while for MCI it was -2.82 MW. Does the PLC definition play a role in here?

Answer: The NSPL changes on 1/1 but the PLC identified by PJM changes on 6/1.  DLC will does a re-analysis of the customer classes in Q4 every year and changes the rate class identity of customers that do not meet the defined kW value of their class (IE: Customer was a MD C&I last year but are now S C&I reclassified on 1/1 because their total demand was not high enough to meet the M C&I classification) .  What the supplier is seeing is the shift that can take place when customers are re-allocated.  But the PLC value for the customers is not changed until 6/1.

GEN 00025

Question: In our review of the initial summer load data and Coincident Peaks to-date, we note that the Residential default service load averaged 900MW during the Coincident Peak periods. This volume is approximately 10% higher than the average of the previous three years, after adjusting for number of customers. Does the utility have any plans to address and account for this unique peak shift in their PLC calculation methodology in order to mitigate the impacts to Residential customer bills?

Answer: DLC does not anticipate mitigating the impact to the Residential customers’ bills to reflect the 10% increase.

GEN 00026

Question: In the load data you provide, there is a "lost power" column. What lost power does that include? Transmission loss, etc?

Answer: Lost power is the difference between system load and what DLC billed to customers.

GEN 00027

Question: What is the reason behind change in the Total 5CP MW-DAY , 1CP MW-DAY each month. Shouldn't that be the same for a class of customers each month?

Answer: The Total 5CP MW-DAY and 1CP MW-DAY change month to month due to changes in the customer counts and migration between customers across rate classes.  The bulk of the change happens in January for 1CP and in June for 5CP. 

GEN 00029

Question: If Alternative Energy Portfolio Requirements change such that there are new Tiers or Classes of Alternative Energy Credits other than Solar, Tier 1 and Tier 2, will suppliers or Duquesne be responsible for those Alternative Energy Credits?

Answer: The Supplier is responsible for any changes or modifications to the AEPS requirements. This would include any new tiers or classes of credits. As noted in Appendix E of the SMA, “If Alternative Energy Portfolio Requirements change by law or any other reason, DS Supplier shall be responsible for providing the credits at its expense in order to comply with its obligations under Full Requirements Service."

RUL 00001

Question: If, for example, a qualified bidder was currently serving one block of Residential load, procured in a previous solicitation, with a term that would overlap the term offered in the March 2017 auction, would the Residential Load Cap for that particular bidder be reduced by one block? Further, would any blocks awarded in the March 2017 auction affect the bidder’s Load Cap for the September 2017 auction?

Answer: Yes.  For the Duquesne Light auction, eligibility is affected by the amount of load currently being served by the supplier.

RUL 00002

Question: Do tranches that are pulled from the auction and tranches that are shifted into other products have the same chance of being rolled back into a prior round product?

Answer: No, if a bidder reduced the total number of tranches it bid across all products, those “reduced” tranches are more likely to be used for rollbacks than tranches that were “switched” from one product to another. As much as possible, such “reduced” tranches are used first for rollbacks, and then “switched” tranches are used for rollbacks if necessary.

RUL 00003

Question: If tranches are shifted into other products and rolled back into a prior round product, how are those tranches identified or earmarked as rolled back so that the bidder has a clear understanding which tranches are subject to rollback?

Answer: When a bidder increases the tranches it bids on a product, the bidder does not specify which product(s) the tranches are coming from. In the rollback algorithm, there is no explicit identification of any switched tranches used for rollbacks. Each tranche is assigned a unique random number. The random numbers are used to select among “reduced” tranches for rollbacks, and then (if necessary) to select among “switched” tranches for rollbacks. When the random process finds a pair of products for which – in effect – a “switched” tranche could be used for a rollback, it does not report the “from” product and the “to” product because all that matters are the rollbacks in aggregate and satisfying a number of constraints per the auction rules (for example, a bidder’s eligibility). Even if it did report the “from” and “to” products, in general that would be meaningless in the sense that if the algorithm were run a second time, it could produce the same result in terms of number of tranches deemed bid on each product (including rollbacks) but with a different set of “from” and “to” products for the switched tranches.

DAT 00001

Question: What are the tranche sizes for the Residential, Small C&I and Medium C&I?

Answer: The tranche sizes can be calculated using the hourly load data provided on the Information Site. The percentage of the load that the tranches represent is available in the auction schedule published here: http://www.duquesnedsp.com/Portals/0/DUQ_Auction_Products_and_Schedule_DSP_VIII.pdf

DAT 00002

Question: When will you post the PLC for Residential & Street Lighting and Small C&I?

Answer: We are working on the data for the month end close and will send the latest PLC data by the end of the week (3/3).  We will be sending refreshed historical data for the Small C&I, Residential and Lighting and Medium C&I.

DAT 00003

Question: For the Historical PLC_NSPL_MW-Day spreadsheets. Is that the PLC/NSPL for the 1st of the month? For example, column A, has the dates listed as 1/1/2018 to 2/1/2017. Are the PLCs an average of the month or only for that specific day listed?

Answer: The Historical PLC_NSPL_MW Day values in the spreadsheets are actual values from the last day of the month of the date shown in column A .

DAT 00004

Question: In the "Historical Load HPS 2015-2016" load data file, unlike other load data, it doesn't split default and egs load data. Are they all default load, egs load or total load?

Answer: The load data provided is Historical Load for HPS customers that have been on default service during the period of time shown.  This load represents a small percentage (2-3%) of the total load that is not being serviced by EGSs (Retail Suppliers).  For this customer class, the amount of customers and load has been, historically, consistent and lacks the switching aspect of the other default service customer classes.  We did not provide the EGS served load at this time but are considering ways to provide this data in the future.     

DAT 00006

Question: What is the loss factor to go from wholesale meter to retail meter for Duquesne?

Answer:

The loss factors are as described in the tariff Section 4.7  Energy Scheduling.

Transmission losses = 0.8%

Distribution losses = calculated using Table 1 of the tariff according to Rate Schedule.

DAT 00007

Question: Can you please provide the LC&I historical PLC data for the same time frame as the other rate classes? Other rate classes have PLC data back to 2008 but the LC&I data is only Feb 2017.

Answer: Duquesne Light Company was able to provide the data from 2015 and 2016 for the large C&I customers.  While this is a different time period of data than was provided for the other market segments, we're hopeful that 2 years of data information will be sufficient.  

DAT 00008

Question: Could you post the most current PLC tags for the Medium C&I customers for the 2017/2018 Planning Year? Without that data being publicly posted to all bidders, then any bidder who is also a current supplier has an unfair informational advantage by knowing how tags were reset for the new Planning Year.

Answer: Additional data for the Medium C&I customers has been posted.  The most recent data includes the June PLC value for the Medium C&I load.

DAT 00009

Question: Looking at the customer count data for RES & SL (“Historical Loads 2011-2017 Residential and Lighting” file, “Customer Counts” tab), there is a steep reduction on customers count on both POLR LT and EGS LT. Total Customer count for both categories was 8,249 in May 2014 reducing to 985 by Dec 2014. Any insight on what drove the decrease on customer count?

Answer: During the period in question, May 2014 through December 2014, Duquesne Light Company was putting into production a new billing platform.  The integration of that new billing platform lead to the consolidation of accounts, as we shifted to a different account number/SA ID format, and the retirement of accounts that were found to be unnecessary to integrate into the new system.  The billing system was fully implemented in Q4 2014.  The numbers provided for 2017 are deemed to be accurate and should be used. 

DAT 00010

Question: Are the PLC and NSPL in the dataroom scaled by daily zonal scaling factor. Do we need to apply PJM RPM daily zonal scaling factor to get the PJM daily PLC?

Answer: PJM does not scale the daily PLC and NSPL because Duquesne Light Company provides the amounts to PJM already scaled. PJM applies a 1.0 scaling factor.

DAT 00011

Question: Does the hourly data through April 2019 reflect the 60 day PJM true up or is some of the data through that period based on initial settled volumes? If the answer is the latter, what is the period that reflects the 60 day true up?

Answer: Only data up to March 2019 reflects the 60 day PJM true up.   As of the date the data was compiled, no other 60 day true up data was available.

DAT 00012

Question: For Medium C& I customers, we noticed that there was a sharp drop in the PLC values for both GM>25 and GMH >25 classes between December 2018 and January 2019. This drop was more pronounced in the POLR customer segment. Since PLCs are reset every June, what is the reason for the drop in January 2019?

Answer: This change was likely due to the reassigning of rate classes to customers effective January 2019.

DAT 00013

Question: For Medium C& I load, we noticed that the total counts of the eligible (POLR + EGS) customers in Medium C & I in Duquesne had increased (5% for GM>25 and 4%for GMH >25) from December 2016 to January 2017. Is there any explanation for that?

Answer: This change was likely due to the reassigning of rate classes to customers effective January 2017. 

DAT 00014

Question: For Medium C& I load, we noticed that the total counts of the eligible (POLR + EGS) customers in Medium C & I had dropped significantly (20% for GM>25 and 24%for GMH >25) from December 2018 to January 2019. Is there any reason behind this drop?

Answer: This change was likely due to the reassigning of rate classes to customers effective January 2019.

DAT 00015

Question: In the historical capacity data provided by Duquesne on their website, we are seeing a significant increase in SCI PLC from December 2017 and 2018 to January 2018 and 2019, 5.7% and 16.0% increases, respectively. We are also seeing a corresponding decrease in the MCI PLC of -5.6% and -11.4% across the same periods.

Answer: Changes in the 1CP are influenced by the change in the 1CP date that changes every January.  Customers are evaluated each year and rate classes can be updated.  Reassignments will be reflected in changes in the data.

DAT 00016

Question: In both January 2018 and January 2019, the MCI customer class experienced a change in customers counts (along with a change in load and capacity peak share). It appears that the customers lost by the MCI class were almost entirely picked up by the SCI customer class. While we expect the capacity peak share to change at the start of every planning year in June, it is problematic for Default Service Providers if the customer class is being "reconstituted" in the middle of the planning year such that the existing class data does not represent the class moving forward. This shifting appears to have occurred with the SCI customer class in 2018 and 2019, with the SCI capacity peak share increasing by almost 20% in January 2019. To state the matter differently: to the extent that SCI gained load and capacity peak share in the middle of the planning year, if the load factor of the new customers coming to SCI is not consistent with the existing SCI customers, then the Default Service Provider can find themselves with significant risk with respect to their peak obligations. Does Duquesne expect to make intra-planning year shuffles between the customer classes again in January 2020? Or, does Duquesne's expect this "shuffling" to stop given that the redefinitions of MCI and LCI occurred already in January 2019?

Answer: Every year, Duquesne Light reviews and analyzes the Small and Medium commercial customers to ensure they are on the correct Distribution rate code for the upcoming year.  This analysis occurs every 4^th quarter and changes are made on January 1^st for the upcoming year.  The shifting of customer counts can occur when a customers demand reflects a need to change their rate code based on the previous year’s consumption data.  For example, a customer that exceeded 25 kW in 2018 but their demand in 2019 is less than 25 kW will be adjusted to reflect the new rate code (and Vice Versa).  This a tariff requirement that the Company reviews the Small and Medium customer classes to ensure customers are on the correct rate classification.  It is not foreseen that this tariff requirement will change in the upcoming years.  

DAT 00017

Question: For the Historical PLC_NSPL_MW-Day spreadsheets, is that the PLC/NSPL for the 1st of the month? Or are the PLCs an average of the month or only for that specific day listed? You have multiple days listed for one month, ie June 2019 has 6/6/2019 and 6/30/2019.

Answer: Analysis is typically done on the last day of the month and data would reflect that date.  In the case of June 2019, there was a request for an early snapshot and as a result there are two values.

DAT 00018

Question: Is there an intention to update the website with data that includes 6/1/23 before the auction?

Answer: Below is the total NSPL for POLR for each segment as of 6/1/2023.

Rate	Total NSPL
HPS	41
MCI	87.1
RES	983.5
SCI	129.2

CRE 00001

Question: Are there any credit-based tranche caps?

Answer: No.

PJM 00001

Question: In the PJM State of the Market Report for 2016 Q3, the estimated Black Start Revenue Requirements for DLCO (Duquesne Zone) are as follows: 2016/2017=$100,000, 2017/2018 = $100,000, 2018/2019 = $3,900,000. Why is there a large increase in planning year 2018/2019 for Black Start revenue requirements for the DLCO zone?

Answer: Black Start units submit annual Black Start revenue requirements to PJM and the IMM for review and approval.  The revenue requirement includes capital, variable, training, and fuel storage costs related to Black Start Service. Zonal rates are based on the capability share of the Black Start Unit’s annual revenue requirements designated to serve that zone.

PJM 00002

Question: What is the current Schedule 1A rate for Duquesne Zone?

Answer: Please refer to the PJM Operating Agreement Transmission Tariff Manual 27 Schedule 1A for additional information on the charges.  The OATT Revisions for Mid-Atlantic Interstate Transmission, LLC Integration has the specific values.  Please see the web address:

http://www.pjm.com/~/media/committees-groups/committees/mc/20160929/20160929-item-04-fe-transition-reorganization-oatt-and-oa-revisions-redline.ashx

PJM 00003

Question: Can you provide the specific PJM Billing Statement Line Items ID#s that the DS Supplier is responsible as part of Rider 9’s Hourly Price Service formula rate?

Answer: The DS Supplier is responsible for all the charges identified in the SMA.  Rider 9 is an explanation of how the customer will be billed. Subsequently, this is how the supplier will be reimbursed and paid.  The primary charges/credits that the DS supplier is not responsible for include NITS, Transmission Enhancement,  Generation Deactivation, Expansion Cost Recovery, and Deferred Tax Adjustment.

PJM 00004

Question: PJM market monitor report forecasts black start charges to increase significantly in 2018 and 2019 for Duquesne zone. Please do you have an insight on when these charges will begin to show on suppliers bill?

Answer: The changes to black start will occur on the PJM planning year which is June through May. Suppliers should plan on any cost changes to black start to occur within that timeframe.

PJM 00005

Question: On February 27, 2022, PJM announced BRA prices for the 2024/2025 Planning Year. Will the Capacity Proxy Price still be used by Duquesne for the 2024/2025 Delivery year?

Answer: No, that Capacity Proxy Price will not be used. BRA results announced by PJM on February 27, 2023, for the 2024/2025 PJM Planning Year are not preliminary results. The announcement of BRA prices means that the Company will not consider using a Capacity Proxy Price for any POLR auction products with exposure to the 2024/2025 PJM Planning Year.

SMA 00001

Question: Please confirm that PJM Line item 1100 (NITSs charges) will be the Company’s responsibility, not the DS Supplier’s.

Answer: Appendix D outlines the supplier's responsibilities.  PJM Line Items 1100 an 2100 (NITS Charges and Credits) will be Duquesne Lights responsibility. 

SMA 00002

Question: Is the Price location Duquesne Residual Aggregate?

Answer: The Market Price Hub is the Duquesne Residual Zonal Aggregate.  The P-node is specifically listed on the Attachment A.

SMA 00003

Question: Are the renewables requirements at the wholesale meter or retail meter?

Answer: The renewable requirements are at the retail meter.

SMA 00004

Question: Will the winning bidders need to complete Exhibit 3 and its Attachment A - Addendum given that the PJM Billing Line Items are now set forth in Appendix D?

Answer:

The Billing Line Item Transfer ("BLI") tool replaced the paper process of completing the Declaration of Authority form ("DOA") in May 2015.  As a result, the DOAs became void and PJM now relies on the information submitted in the BLI tool.  Duquesne does not require bidders to complete Exhibit 3 and its Attachment A – Addendum for Billing Line Item Transfers.  The DOAs will continue to be utilized for other PJM business matters if necessary and may be executed depending on the request of either party.  

SMA 00005

Question: According to Appendix E of the SMA, "For each compliance period during the Delivery Period, the number of (Alternative Energy Credits) AECs that a DS Supplier is obligated to provide may be reduced by a pre-determined number of AECs allocated to the DS Supplier (“Allocated AECs”). The number of Allocated AECs will be defined prior to the Transaction Date." Please advise when such allocation will be made.

Answer: No Alternative Energy Credits have been purchased or obtained by the Company for the Auction that is being conducted in March 2018.  There will be no assignment of AECs to the Suppliers.  As a result the bidders should expect to provide the AECs that are required. 

SMA 00006

Question: Appendix E of the SMA states that Suppliers may be allocated a pre-determined number of AECs for use in AEPS compliance, and that the number allocated will be defined prior to the Transaction Date. Will any AECs be allocated to Suppliers who are awarded load in the March 2017 auction? More specifically, does the DS Variable Payments provision fully compensate Suppliers for all charges assigned to DS Suppliers in Appendix D except 1365, 1375, 1376, and 1378 (ignoring all 1200-series charges, which we understand are partially recovered through the hourly pricing structure of the product)?

Answer: Suppliers will not be allocated any AECs for use in AEPS compliance for the RFP auction being conducted on March 23, 2017.  Suppliers should plan to procure the full AECs requirements that are associated with the load they serve.  DS Variable Payments provision is explained in the Transaction Confirmation and in Rider 9 of our tariff.  The company will remit payment to the suppliers based on the Rider 9 calculation.   

SMA 00007

Question: Please confirm that in addition to the ‘DS Fixed Price Adder For Hourly Price Service’ (auction clearing price), the winning supplier will receive all revenues collected as outlined in the Rider no. 9 tariff (with the exception of the gross receipts taxes and the fixed retail administrative charge - other than the DS Fixed Price Adder For Hourly Price Service). Some context for this question: the ‘DS Variable Payments’ is referenced in both the ‘Transaction Confirmation for Hourly Price Transactions’ and ‘Section 9.1 (a) Bill and Payment’. As defined the ‘DS Variable Payments’ refers to Appendix C, but Appendix C doesn’t point to Rider no. 9 or outline any payments to the winning supplier.

Answer: That is correct.

SMA 00008

Question: Please confirm that the COd in Rider 9 (capacity obligation in MW) represent the customer’s Unforced Capacity (UCAP) as determined by PJM.

Answer: The capacity obligation is determined by PJM.  In order to be consistent, the "Determination of Capacity Obligation" within Rider 9 needs to be applied. 

SMA 00009

Question: In the Supplier Master Agreement the definition of DS Variable Payments is as follows: “The variable supplier payments in dollars based on the Company’s Hourly Price Service formula rate, as set forth in Appendix C hereto, associated with serving the DS Supplier Responsibility Share of the DS Supply.” The referenced formula does not appear to be in appendix C; where is this formula set forth?

Answer: Please refer to Rider 9 for the formula rate and the Transaction Confirmation for Hourly Priced Service.   

SMA 00010

Question: Please list all the payment streams a winning Large C&I supplier would receive.

Answer: The supplier will receive all monies billed to the customer with the exception of the GRT and Duquesne Lights portion of the Fixed Retail Administrative Charge (FRA).  Please refer to Rider 9 and previous answers provided on this question for more information. 

SMA 00011

Question: Is "Reactive Supply and Voltage Control" supplier's responsibilities? If yes, can you please provide the current level for it?

Answer: Appendix D of the SMA outlines the suppliers responsibilities.  Reactive Supply and Voltage Control from Generation & OSS, Billing Line Item 1330 is an ancillary charge that is the supplier's responsibility.  Please refer to the Customer Guide to PJM Billing, and/or the OATT Schedule2, Manual 27, section 3 for more information on this charge.  PJM routinely publishes this information on their Billing, Settlements and Credits are of their website.                                                                              

SMA 00012

Question: Are suppliers of the Hourly Price Service for the Large Commercial and Industrial Class fully compensated via DS Variable Payments for all line items listed in Appendix D, with exception for items relating to balancing energy costs? More specifically, does the DS Variable Payments provision fully compensate Suppliers for all charges assigned to DS Suppliers in Appendix D except 1365, 1375, 1376, and 1378 (ignoring all 1200-series charges, which we understand are partially recovered through the hourly pricing structure of the product)?

Answer: Duquesne will be remitting to the DS Supplier the amounts that are billed to the customer in Rider 9, with the exception of GRT and the utilities portion of the FRA.

SMA 00013

Question: Can you explain why in the Information Session PowerPoint it says that transmission is the responsibility of the default service supplier; however, on earlier slides you say NITS are not?

Answer: Suppliers must deliver a sufficient energy to cover the needs of the default service customers of The Duquesne Light Company which would include energy to cover distribution losses.  Suppliers are, however, paid the auction price for all MWh delivered to the delivery point.  Suppliers are not paid for losses that occur up to the delivery point.  The MSA includes the details of PJM charges that are the responsibility of the supplier and the EDU.

Supply Master Agreement SMA Reference Appendix D

 

SMA 00014

Question: Per SMA Exhibit JP-3, references REC obligations can be reduced if the utility transfers RECs to the DS supplier. Please confirm that for the current bid, no alternative energy credits have been purchased or will be purchased for the delivery periods in this procurement cycle.

Answer: There are no reductions to the Wholesale suppliers AEPS obligations for the delivery periods that are being procured at this auction.  Duquesne Light will not be reducing the DS suppliers AEPS obligations for any delivery periods.     

SMA 00015

Question: On the Duquesne website there is a Default Service Rate Calculation for each product/segment, which shows the average winning bid price for the segment and then adds line losses to the price along with other components which makeup the retail supply rate. Should line losses be included in the bid we are submitting? Example of the calculation, this is the link for the Small C&I Tariff Rate - https://www.duquesnelight.com/docs/default-source/default-document-library/actual---default-service-rate-calculation-model---small59e7c60262c1670a862eff320080324a.pdf?sfvrsn=ce26a142_0

Answer: Please refer to the Supplier Master Agreement posted to the Information Website for the definition of "DS Supply".  

DS Supply includes all necessary Energy, Capacity, AECs for AEPS Act compliance, Ancillary Services, all transmission and distribution losses and congestion and imbalance costs associated with the provision of such services, and such other services or products that the DS Supplier may be required, by PJM or any governmental body having jurisdiction, to provide in order to meet the DS Supplier Responsibility Share for serving DS Load.

The DS supplier will be paid in association with the provisions of DS Supply as detailed in Article 9 of the Supplier Master Agreement. 

SMA 00017

Question: Does the 8% AEPS Tier 1 requirement for 20/21 include solar? i.e. is the 0.5% SRECs part of the 8% tier 1? or they are totally separate?

Answer: The 0.5% Solar is part of the 8% Tier 1. The 0.5% is the minimum.

SMA 00018

Question: If we are a winning bidder in the upcoming auction and are a current supplier who has executed the SMA in a previous auction, do we execute a new SMA or do we receive transaction confirmation under the previously executed SMA?

Answer: Once the results of the Auction have been approved, the winning bidders are expected to sign the SMA. During DSP-VIII, Duquesne Light introduced a generic version of the Supplier Master Agreement. The generic SMA only needs to be signed once during the DSP-IX auction cycle.

Two types of winning bidders for the upcoming auction:

• Bidders that previously signed the generic SMA

− Will receive a transaction confirmation from Duquesne

− Do not need to sign a new SMA

• Bidders that have not signed the generic SMA

− Will sign the generic SMA

− Will receive a transaction confirmation from Duquesne for future winning bids.