Board of Trustees Approval: the date on which the NERC Board of Trustees approved the standard in accordance with the implementation plan proposed by the standard.

Effective for Mandatory Enforcement: the date on which the standard becomes mandatory and enforceable in accordance with the existing laws of the jurisdiction.  (This date may or may not be the same as the NERC board approved implementation date.)

Currently, the legislative framework to make standards mandatory and enforceable exists through action of the regulatory authority in the United States (through FERC) and in the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columbia, Nova Scotia, and Quebec.  Of these, only FERC has taken action to approve reliability standards as mandatory and enforceable.  In addition, standards become mandatory and enforceable upon NERC board action in the Canadian provinces of Manitoba (Manitoba Hydro only), New Brunswick, Ontario, and Saskatchewan.  The National Energy Board of Canada is contemplating making reliability standards mandatory and enforceable for international power lines.