Power companies shake up PJM, remove board chair
Companies operating in the embattled regional power market PJM Interconnection removed two board members Monday, including Chair Mark Takahashi, in what some are calling a sharp rebuke for how it has handled rising power prices and potential electricity shortages.
The board shakeup comes on the heels of an earlier announcement by PJM CEO Manu Asthana that he plans to leave the regional transmission organization at the end of the year.
Frustration by energy companies on the grid serving the Great Lakes and mid-Atlantic regions — utilities, power producers and transmission companies — has been boiling for months, and it has increasingly spilled over into state capitals. Last summer, wholesale power prices increased ninefold during a PJM capacity auction. And that got a reaction from Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro (D), who demanded PJM agree to limit the multibillion-dollar payments to generators that guarantee future supply. If PJM didn't go along with a plan to protect consumers, Shapiro said, he would consider pulling his state out of the power market.
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PJM's leadership is struggling to address the shrinking gap between electricity supply and demand as data centers, high-tech factories and bitcoin miners plug into the grid. Old coal plants are closing at the same time — a dynamic that is driving future power prices higher.
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