By Tom Kleckner
ERCOT on Wednesday asked Texans to reduce their electricity usage Thursday and Friday, when the state is expected to see some of the highest temperatures of the year amid tight reserve margins.
The National Weather Service expects temperatures to reach triple digits in all the state’s major metropolitan areas through Sept. 7. The grid operator issued an extreme hot weather alert on Tuesday for Friday and Saturday.
ERCOT is projecting peak demand of 72.7 GW on Thursday and 73.3 GW on Friday. That would smash the two new September demand records of more than 68.4 GW set earlier this week, which themselves were more than 1.5 GW above the previous mark set in 2016.
“ERCOT’s job is to ensure power is available all over Texas,” CEO Bill Magness said in a statement. “When electricity demand and heat reach levels like we expect on Thursday and Friday, we ask Texans to consider taking a few steps to help keep power flowing for all of us.”
Public Utility Commission Chair DeAnn Walker echoed Magness’ comments and noted the stress placed on generators by the sustained high temperatures.
“Operating at high efficiency like this can be a bit of a balancing act, so the PUC and ERCOT are working together to encourage Texans to conserve on Thursday and Friday afternoon,” she said in a statement.
The markets are expecting real-time prices to spike along with the temperatures. Thursday prices in the day-ahead market were settling on Wednesday afternoon at just over $5,000/MWh for the 5 p.m. hour.
ERCOT expects to see the same trough of early afternoon wind generation that, combined with nearly 5 GW of generation outages, replicates the situations that led to the grid operator calling two energy emergency alerts (EEAs) in August. Prices hit the $9,000/MWh limit during both EEAs. (See “ERCOT CEO Briefs Commission on Summer Performance,” Texas PUC Briefs: Aug. 29, 2019.)
However, the grid operator expects demand to be higher this week than it was during the EEAs.
ERCOT began the summer with an 8.6% reserve margin. It set a new all-time peak of 74.7 GW on Aug. 12, and it has recorded 11 other demand marks above the record set a year ago. Last year, ERCOT broke its previous record 14 times.
Austin, home to ERCOT, exceeded 100 degrees Fahrenheit during 27 of August’s 31 days.
