Transmission Owner Transmission Solutions

Several other facilities have been or are being constructed near Indian Point Energy Center which at one point attempted to qualify for the original 2012 contingency plan solicitation from the NYSPSC.

An energy highway initiative was prompted by the Indian Point Contingency Plan order from 2012 (generally speaking, additional lines on the Edic-Pleasant Valley and the Oakdale-Fraser transmission corridors) which is still going through the regulatory process in both the NYISO and NYSPSC.^[13][14]

Other projects include the proposed Champlain Hudson Power Express and the in-service (as of October 1, 2018) CPV Valley Energy plant, a 650 MW natural gas plant located in Wawayanda, New York.^[15] The CPV Valley plant has been associated with Governor Cuomo's close aid, Joe Percoco, and the associated corruption trial.^[16] There was a 1,000 MW merchant HVDC transmission line proposed in 2013 to the NYSPSC that would have interconnected at Athens, New York and Buchanan, New York, however this project was indefinitely stalled when its proposed southern converter station site was bought by the Town of Cortlandt in a land auction administered by Con Edison.^[17][18][19] Another plant being built, Cricket Valley Energy Center, rated at 1,100 MW, is on schedule to provide energy by 2020 in Dover, New York.^[20]

FERC has also been instrumental in developing wholesale market policy in the region of New York that TOTS was designed to alleviate. Approved in 2013 and upheld by a federal appeals court in 2015,^[21] a new capacity zone for the NYISO's wholesale capacity market was implemented. Previously, the state only had three locational capacity zones in the wholesale capacity market (rest of state, New York City, and Long Island). The new capacity zone is a fourth zone that extends from the Hudson Valley to New York City and essentially acts as a price floor to the New York City capacity zone price. Historically, the Hudson Valley zone and two other zones north of New York City were located in the lower priced rest-of-state zone. The NYISO's wholesale capacity market provides wholesale energy producers with a revenue stream independent of actual energy production and based upon a unit's power production capability, but it has never been called a standby fee or market.^[22][23][24] While the creation of new capacity zones has been historically documented, the NYISO has disallowed policy that would provide the ability to remove a capacity zone in the state if a transmission corridor is deemed unrestrained.^[25]

At least one member of the NYSPSC staff responsible for guiding the TOTS projects through the state regulatory process in the years 2012-2016, Raj Addepalli, retired in 2016 as an office Director with a final salary of $165,489 and a total compensation of $181,178 - the highest level of compensation for the department that year.^[26][27]