Forbes Piece: Texas Grid Nears Crisis Conditions Before Summer Even Arrives

[Note: This story is also posted at Forbes.com]

Officials at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) weren’t able to even make it to the first official day of summer this year before having to issue a voluntary conservation notice to Texans, as the state’s electricity grid came perilously close to being unable to meet high demand on June 20.

“ERCOT has issued a Voluntary Conservation Notice for today, June 20, from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m., and controlled outages are not needed at this time,” the notice, updated at 3:57 p.m. CST, began. “ERCOT is not in emergency operations. Texans are being asked to voluntarily reduce electric use, if safely able to do so.”

As of 4:49 p.m., ERCOT said system-wide demand had exceeded 79,000 MW, an all-time record high for the date, leaving the system with less than 5,000 MW of reserve available generation capacity. The tight conditions come in the midst of a heat wave that had been forecast by weather services for well over a week in advance, so the conditions should have come as no surprise to grid operators.