ERCOT said it did not experience grid reliability issues with the loss of solar generation during Saturday’s annular solar eclipse, in what some saw as a performance check before next year’s total eclipse.
“It should be a really good test case,” ERCOT COO Woody Rickerson told the Public Utility Commission during an open meeting Thursday. “We don’t expect any problems.”
The Texas grid operator had several ancillary services available should there have been an “unknown, unforeseen” issue, he said. (See ERCOT Prepared for Eclipse, Loss of Solar.)
Solar production dropped from just over 7,000 MW to 1,474 MW between 10:49 and 11:49 a.m. CT as the eclipse’s “ring of fire” traversed Texas. Natural gas resources helped compensate for the solar drop with more than a 4,000-MW increase in their generation.
“A solar plant will experience a shadow moving over it, but at a different time than other solar plants,” Rickerson said.
A total eclipse will cross over Texas from Mexico and continue into Canada on April 8. It will be last eclipse visible in the continental U.S. until 2044.
ERCOT has almost 12 GW of solar capacity available during the fall season. The resource was credited with helping the grid operator meet record demand during a blistering summer this year, accounting for about 15% of the grid’s fuel mix during the heat of the afternoon.
