COVID-19: The National Centre for Energy Control has ordered certain measures to ensure efficiency and continuity of the National Electric System

Mexico - 07 / 05 / 2020

Mexico Alert

Based on the argument that the pandemic has cause a reduction of electricity consumption by end users and thus additional measures have to be taken in order to guarantee the efficiency, quality, reliability, continuity and safety of the National Electricity System, on May 1, a ruling dated April 29 was published in the Market Information System, wherein the National Center for Energy Control (CENACE) decrees certain technical measures to be observed.

The measures are the following:

The electrical infrastructure of the National Transmission Network will operate within its design capacity.
Depending on the availability of generation resources, the operating limits of the main transmission corridors will be subject to operating at determined magnitudes without dependence on Remedial Action Schemes (RAS), except in those areas where there is insufficient generation resources.
In the operating condition that there is not enough generation resources in any area, region, or System, the transmission limits determined with the dependence of the RAS will be activated.
Must run power plant units will be registered in some regions of the National Electric System.
As of May 3, the preoperative tests of intermittent wind and photovoltaic power plants in the process of commercial operation are suspended, also, the start of preoperative tests will not be authorized.
In Electrically Insulated Interconnected Systems with integration of intermittent wind and photovoltaic power plants, actions and strategies will be applied to strengthen the sufficiency, quality and continuity of supply. These strategies have not yet been published.
The applications for programmed outages in the National Transmission Network will be analyzed to determine the viability, dates and times in which the reliability of the National Electric System is observed without the dependence of RAS upon the occurrence of the N-1 contingency.

The Ruling does not define the period of time in which these measures shall be applicable.