Texas’ power grid operator, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), is preparing for statewide electricity demand to surge to near-record levels this Mother’s Day weekend as unseasonably warm weather spreads across the region.
On May 3, ERCOT requested some power plant operators postpone any planned maintenance outages and end outages already in progress. This way, the plants are online to meet demand as Texans crank up air conditioners to keep cool, KERA News reports.
As of May 4, the grid’s electricity load was expected to peak just below 70 gigawatts on both Sunday and Monday, with daytime high temperatures reaching the 90s in Austin, Dallas, and Houston and triple digits in cities like San Antonio, Laredo, and Midland.
ERCOT, which manages approximately 90% of Texas’s power load, stated that it does not intend to ask consumers to conserve energy this weekend because it believes there will be sufficient capacity.
As part of regulatory reforms enacted in response to the deadly winter storm blackouts in February 2021, ERCOT is working to implement stricter controls on how and when power plants can schedule maintenance. However, many of the new rules have yet to be implemented.
ERCOT urged Texans to conserve energy in April 2021 when electricity demand nearly exceeded supply. Many power plants were shut down for maintenance at the time. A few months later, the grid operator reminded residents to reduce their electricity consumption.
According to Doug Lewin, CEO of energy consulting firm Stoic Energy, electricity demand this weekend is likely to exceed the grid’s previous high for May of roughly 67 gigawatts, set in 2018. Summer demand’s record to beat is 74.8 gigawatts.
According to Lewin, Texas’ power grid could easily handle the electricity load this weekend if operating at full capacity. Still, the early arrival of summer-like weather has coincided with a time when power plant operators typically shut down for scheduled maintenance.
“It’s not super uncommon for us to see temperatures like that in July and August,” Lewin told KERA News. “Why is this giving us problems in May? The reason is because these plants do go down en masse for planned maintenance this time of year because we don’t expect April or May to have July-type temperatures.”
Long-term solutions to the problem, according to Lewin, will necessitate not only increasing the amount of power available but also reducing demand through greater efficiencies, as unpredictable weather is now a fact of life.
“We’re going to get more and more of these with each passing year. This is a shift that we have to make as a species: it’s that climate change is not a 2050 thing. It is a 2022 thing. We are living in an already altered climate,” he said.
According to Lewin, ERCOT recognized that a surge in demand caused by the hot weather this weekend could overwhelm the grid’s capacity, potentially resulting in blackouts. He added that the entire thermal fleet — coal, gas, and nuclear — is about 66 gigawatts.
“As of early this week, a little more than 20 gigawatts was offline,” he said. “So right about 30% were offline for maintenance.”
Sometimes believe our state government has now made Texas a third world country?