FERC-740, Availability of E-Tag Information to Commission Staff

This collection of information is authorized by 18 CFR 366.2(d), which requires Commission access, on a non-public and view-only basis, to information that is located on “electronic tags,” also known as “e-Tags.” Each e-Tag consists of an electronic record of a transaction to transfer energy from a generation source to a Balancing Authority (BA). Each BA operates a portion of the grid, balancing supply and demand and assuring compliance with federal reliability standards. E-Tag “authors” are typically Purchasing-Selling Entities (PSEs). A PSE purchases or sells energy, capacity, and Interconnected Operations Services. Transmission system operators, which are among the addressees of e-Tags, use e-Tags to ascertain the transactions affecting their local systems, and to prevent damage to the power grid. Commission access to e-Tags helps the Commission detect and prevent market manipulation and anti-competitive behavior, and monitor the efficiency of markets. Both transmission system operators and the Commission need the e-Tag information to understand the use of the interconnected electricity grid, particularly transactions occurring at interchanges. Due to the nature of the electric grid, an individual transaction’s impact on an interchange cannot be assessed adequately in all cases without information from all connected systems, which is included in the e-Tags. The inclusion of the Commission among the addresses of e-Tags is completely automatic and is part of the normal business requirement. Thus, the time, effort, and financial resources necessary to comply with this collection of information are “usual and customary” within the meaning of the OMB regulation at 5 CFR 1320.3 (b)(2) (excluding such activities from the definition of “burden”). In view of these circumstances, FERC is including only a “placeholder” burden of one hour to account for the rare event where a new BA qualifies for exemption under the Commission’s regulations (e.g., transmissions from a new non-U.S. BA into another non-U.S. BA using a path that does not go through a U.S. BA). In that case, this administrative function would be expected to require at most an hour of effort total from both the BA and e-Tag administrator to include the BA on the exemption list. New exempt BAs are not common—years may pass between them—but for the purpose of estimation, we will conservatively assume one appears each year.

The latest form for FERC-740, Availability of E-Tag Information to Commission Staff expires 2029-03-31 and can be found here.