ERCOT seasonal report out as record-breaking temperatures loom
NORTH TEXAS (CBSDFW.COM) - With record heat comes record energy use and Texas homes and businesses are putting their units and the state's power grid to the test.
ERCOT (Electric Reliability Council of Texas) has released their seasonal report showing how prepared the state's electric grid is for summer, and while it says Texas has sufficient power for normal conditions, the state is already seeing abnormal temperatures.
Officials with ERCOT say the grid is producing more power than ever but Texans are also using more than ever, as the state continues to grow. As it stands, the council anticipates there will be more than 91,000 megawatts of resource capacity available during summer peak demand hours.
Despite ERCOT's reassurances that reserves are in good shape, one expert points out reserves will not hold up if summer temperatures are hotter than normal.
"This past week has shown us that we shouldn't always just expect typical weather or average weather," said Daniel Cohan, professor of environmental engineering at Rice University.
Just after ERCOT's summer forecast report was released Cohan said, "In a normal summer or in an average summer they're predicting a bigger cushion, a bigger margin than they have for a couple years. Now what the scenarios show we're not prepared for is a real extreme heat wave."
During the spring Texas already saw temperatures climb higher than they have in decades - with the risk of more intense heat and drought to come this summer.
"We might get lucky with the weather like we have the past couple summers and be just fine," Cohan said adding, "But I do think we run some risks of at least localized outages if we get into a record heat wave this summer."
Last fall the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission recommended Texas connect to other grids in the US or Mexico as a backup energy source, but the state's grid still stands alone.
Cohan thinks the decision to stay stagnant is ill-thought out. "In every other energy market we've been willing to buy and sell from our neighbors around the country and around the world. We do that with oil. We do that with natural gas," he said. "Why we don't do that with electricity really baffles me and I think is a wrong move."
According to the report, ERCOT does expect to have a reserve margin of about 23-percent on the hottest day of the year... as long as that heat isn't worse than normal.