Saint Paul, Minn. Midwest Reliability Organization (MRO) is pleased to announce that it is in the final stages of developing its 2024 Business Plan and Budget, a draft of which is now available for industry review and comment.
The draft budget of $24.9 million reflects an overall increase of 7.8 percent from the 2023 budget and invests in the necessary resources to support the ERO Enterprise vision of a highly reliable and secure North American bulk power system. In developing the budget, MRO’s leadership team focused on prioritizing investments around the strategic plan fundamentals of people, processes and partnerships and the following three-year strategic priorities:
- Ensure that MRO remains an innovative, resilient, and high-performing organization with an increased emphasis on leadership development and culture.
- Drive operational excellence throughout MRO in all processes and procedures, while emphasizing effectiveness and efficiency.
- Develop a nimble, adaptive, and collaborative culture that allows MRO to carry out its mission as a trusted and valued member of the ERO Enterprise.
The primary reason for the 2024 budget increase is the addition of two new full-time equivalents (FTEs) in the Reliability Analysis and Risk Assessment and Mitigation areas. Other costs impacting the budget include people-first initiatives to enhance staff training, attract new talent, and retain a high caliber workforce. Also adding to the increase is a one-time expenditure to replace of end-of-life IT fixed assets. Regarding the assessment charged to load-serving entities, the draft 2024 budget proposes a 15 percent increase over 2023 (from $20.5 million to $23.6 million). An adjustment of $1.3 million from MRO’s reserves will be used to stabilize assessments and offset the increase.
The draft 2024 Business Plan and Budget is available for review on MRO’s website. Comments and questions should be directed to MRO’s Vice President and Engineer for Strategy, Innovation and Finance Lam Chung no later than June 5, 2023.
Following the comment period, the draft 2024 Business Plan and Budget will be presented to the MRO Board of Directors for approval at its June 15, 2023 meeting. Following MRO Board approval, the budget is presented to the NERC Board of Trustees for approval and then filed with FERC. FERC typically issues an order approving the business plans and budgets of NERC and the six Regional Entities in the October/November timeframe.
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Midwest Reliability Organization (MRO) is a non-profit organization dedicated to ensuring the reliability and security of the bulk power system in the central region of North America, including parts of both the United States and Canada. MRO is one of six regional entities in North America operating under authority from regulators in the United States through a delegation agreement with the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) and in Canada under similar arrangements. The primary focus of MRO is developing and ensuring compliance with reliability standards and assessing the grid’s ability to meet the demands for electricity.