Managing the energy grid: Inside MISO and SPP
When regional transmission organization (RTO) Midcontinent Independent System Operator literally turns on the power switch to its state-of-the-art command center in West Little Rock on June 1, Arkansas will be at the epicenter of the nation’s ongoing and often raucous debate on the safety and reliability of the nation’s energy grid system.
Along with Southwest Power Pool’s $62 million relatively new campus with its own real-time data and operations center about 3.4 miles from the MISO headquarters, both nonprofit grid operators now staff a specially-trained group of engineers that oversee the smooth flow of nearly one-third of the nation’s power generation across all or parts of at least 23 states and Canada.
Once fully operational, MISO’s 50,000-square-foot Little Rock campus will control the organization’s (RTO) South region, which includes 18,000 miles of transmission, 50,000 megawatts (MW) of general capacity, and 30,000 MW of load into the MISO southern footprint across parts of Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas and the city of New Orleans.
