{"id":22923,"date":"2025-03-31T11:17:53","date_gmt":"2025-03-31T17:17:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/farmington-electric-looks-to-join-four-corners-power-group\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T04:20:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:20:12","slug":"farmington-electric-looks-to-join-four-corners-power-group","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/farmington-electric-looks-to-join-four-corners-power-group\/","title":{"rendered":"Farmington Electric looks to join Four Corners power group"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Power
Power generated at the Sun Bear Solar Facility will be transmitted on the Western Area Power Administration lines near Shiprock. The lines have increased capacity as coal-fired power plants in the region shutter. (Jerry McBride\/ Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

Farmington Electric Utility System Director Hank Adair says joining a regional transmission organization could reduce by 25% the price the utility pays to purchase power.<\/p>\n

Adair told the Tri-City Record<\/em> that the utility plans to join Southwest Power Pool\u2019s RTO West starting in 2026.<\/p>\n

Utilities across New Mexico are looking at joining RTOs because of the benefits they provide, including lower costs of power from the market and more efficiency in managing electricity flows throughout the region.<\/p>\n

RTOs allow participating utilities to participate in an integrated marketplace and engage in reliability coordination. Farmington had the choice of joining the California Independent System Operator\u2019s RTO or the one through Southwest Power Pool.<\/p>\n

\"Farmington
Farmington Electric Utility System Director Hank Adair says joining a regional transmission organization could reduce the price the utility pays to purchase power by 25%. (Courtesy Mayor Duckett YouTube channel)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Adair said FEUS chose to go with Southwest Power because of \u201cwhere we\u2019re located and what other utilities that we\u2019re with are doing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some of the other utilities planning to join Southwest Power\u2019s RTO West include Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association and the Western Area Power Administration.<\/p>\n

Tri-State provides power to rural electric cooperatives throughout New Mexico and Colorado, including La Plata Electric Association in Durango, Empire Electric Association in Cortez and Northern Rio Arriba Electric Cooperative in Chama.<\/p>\n

Western Area Powers\u2019 decision to join an RTO was one of the reasons FEUS chose to do the same, according to Adair.<\/p>\n

Adair said Western Area Power has served as FEUS\u2019 balancing authority in the past. When it announced it would join an RTO, \u201cFarmington had a choice to either become our own balancing authority\u201d or to join RTO West and allow Southwest Power to act as the balancing authority, Adair said. He said another option was to partner with another utility that would act as FEUS\u2019 balancing authority.<\/p>\n

\u201cBased on where we\u2019re at and our interest in maintaining or being with SPP, we chose to join the RTO,\u201d Adair said.<\/p>\n

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approved allowing seven entities to join Southwest Power\u2019s RTO as transmission-owning members, including Tri-State and Western Area Power, on March 20. This will make Southwest Power\u2019s RTO the first one to provide transmission and interconnection services across two of the country\u2019s three major interconnections.<\/p>\n

\"Tri-State
Tri-State Generation and Transmission CEO Duane Highley spoke at the annual Empire Electric Association meeting Thursday in Cortez. (Jim Mimiaga\/The Journal)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cThe Western expansion of the SPP RTO bolsters reliability and resiliency for our members as we grow and diversify our resource portfolio while reducing emissions,\u201d according to Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association CEO Duane Highley, writing in a news release after the FERC decision.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe greatly value the full benefits of the SPP RTO, including day-ahead and ancillary services markets, efficient regional transmission planning, a common transmission tariff and participatory governance model that help us to further reduce costs for our members across the West,\u201d he said. \u201cPrior to SPP RTO West entry, we will be making a filing with our state regulators highlighting these market benefits.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those seven entities \u2013 as well as FEUS \u2013 are already participating in Southwest Power\u2019s Western Energy Imbalance Service.<\/p>\n

While FEUS was not one of the entities included in the FERC approval, the action paves the way for utilities like FEUS to join Southwest Power\u2019s RTO. Because Farmington is a municipal-owned utility, it does not require approval or oversight from the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission to join an RTO.<\/p>\n

Southwest Power stated in a news release that it is working with additional Western utilities that have expressed interest in joining the RTO.<\/p>\n

\"Jerry
Jerry McBride\/ Durango HeraldThe Western Area Power Administration transmission on Friday, March 15, 2024, will carry the energy produced from the future 4,400 acre solar farm that the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe will be building on the reservation west of Towaoc.<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tri-State and Western Area Power also plan to join regional transmission organization<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22924,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-22923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22923"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22923\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77905,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22923\/revisions\/77905"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22923"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=22923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}