The PJM Market Monitoring Plan provides:
The Market Monitoring Unit shall prepare and submit contemporaneously to the Commission, the State Commissions, the PJM Board, PJM Management and to the PJM Members Committee, annual state-of-the-market reports on the state of competition within, and the efficiency of, the PJM Markets, and quarterly reports that update selected portions of the annual report and which may focus on certain topics of particular interest to the Market Monitoring Unit. The quarterly reports shall not be as extensive as the annual reports. In its annual, quarterly and other reports, the Market Monitoring Unit may make recommendations regarding any matter within its purview. The annual reports shall, and the quarterly reports may, address, among other things, the extent to which prices in the PJM Markets reflect competitive outcomes, the structural competitiveness of the PJM Markets, the effectiveness of bid mitigation rules, and the effectiveness of the PJM Markets in signaling infrastructure investment. These annual reports shall, and the quarterly reports may include recommendations as to whether changes to the Market Monitoring Unit or the Plan are required.
The goal of competition in PJM is to provide customers wholesale power at the lowest possible price, but no lower. The PJM markets have done that. The
PJM markets work, even if not perfectly. The results of the energy market were competitive in the first nine months of 2020. The results of the last base capacity auction, run in 2018 for 2021/2022, were not competitive and the underlying issues need to be addressed, including the overstated offer cap in the capacity market. The PJM markets bring customers the benefits of competition. But the PJM markets, and wholesale power markets in the U.S., continue to face challenges that potentially threaten the viability of competitive markets.
The value of markets is under attack, from those who assert that energy prices are too low and from those who assert that markets are incompatible with decarbonization of the power sector. Organized, competitive wholesale power markets are the best way to facilitate the least cost path to decarbonization. Markets provide incentives for innovation and efficiency. Renewables can compete. Innovation will occur in renewable technologies in unpredictable and beneficial ways. [However, it should be noted that O&M costs have been recently increasing in mature wind and solar projects, which also need to be supported by other sources of grid-power, often coming from natural gas at the expense of nuclear power (more).]
[Note: There are about 200 references to nuclear power in the above report.]
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