Bonneville Power Administration to Join Southwest Power Pool’s Markets+ Program

The Bonneville Power Administration (BPA), a federal power marketing agency in the Pacific Northwest, has issued its day ahead market draft policy direction determining that it should take part in a day ahead market and pursue participation in the Southwest Power Pool’s (SPP) Markets+ program. SPP is the grid operator for 17 states in the central and western U.S.

The draft policy has been put together following a robust stakeholder process that examined the day ahead market services of SPP and the California Independent System Operator. The draft policy infers that partaking in the day ahead market is in the best interest of BPA’s consumers. Moreover, the policy details how participation will allow continued accessibility to trading participants through a well-functioning market with tight bid-offer spreads, robust trading volumes, market optimization, dependability of generation supply benefits and broader accessibility to a large portfolio of resources.

The administration concluded that Markets+ is the most effective day-ahead market choice due to its enhanced market and governance structure, as well as stakeholder procedures. BPA favours the market design of Markets+ because of its mutual resource standard, handling of firm power involvement, congestion rents, and BPA consumer requirements for greenhouse gas accounting.

Markets+ is a real-time and day-ahead market that is expected to launch in the West in 2027. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s approval of the Markets + tariff in January permits participants to begin phase two of Markets+ development following the execution of phase-two funding commitments. The grid operator announced the service in 2022 to centralize day-ahead and real-time unit commitment and dispatch, offer barrier-free transmission service across its footprint, and facilitate reliable integration of an expanding fleet of renewable generation.

The administration will examine public comments following a 30-day comment period and aims to issue a final record of decision during May 2025.