I just received this alert on my CAISO app:
Here's the price maps in the CAISO app:
The highest price on the price map at 7:40PM is GUALALA_6_N001 way up there on the coast North of Santa Rosa at $152.77568/MWh. It shows $12.7735 in congestion pricing (not huge), $117.17625 in energy price (pretty huge), and $22.82593 in losses (which must be why it's the highest price spot).
I'll try to remember to post the (grid side only) Net Use graphs later tonight before they get taken down at midnight. But a word description is easy: it's very hot (air conditioner users), the sun went down (no solar), and there's no wind being caught, so peak use is forecast as 35GW, and net use shot up 3.5GW in 1 hour (10% of use), 5.5GW in 2 hours (15% of use), and 8GW in 3 hours (25% of use), which is a touch more than yesterday, which only saw a peak of 31GW (4GW lower than today), a rise of 6GW in 2 hours (17% of use) (and also a rise of 8GW in 3 hours (26% of use)). So, we have no wind, and we don't know how many people are arriving home right now from long commutes who are having to turn on their air conditioners because they are swealtering.
I have no idea how load planning and dirty energy ramp up planning and abilities are in the supply grid in terms of what's available. Obviously, to avoid clean energy curtailment, they try to shave the dirty energy ramp ups thinner to what's needed so that they don't have to pay for dirty energy to just be running even though there's clean energy available, but today is one of those "firsts" when they sort of get to see a steep evening event with this much heat and collected solar power change (9.8GW on grid to 0), and lack of wind. Think of it: the more sun we get, the more solar power we get and the more heat we get, making both the peak solar power collection and peak power use higher, which makes the points in the net use graph further apart.
This is why we need more Tesla! Let's get running, GigaFactory! Come On Nevada! Make Those PowerPacks and PowerWalls! Or something like that. We also need load shift (potential) pricing exposed far enough into pocketbooks that interested parties buy and install energy storage for integrated use. It's almost as if it couldn't have been timed better with the GF ramp up, even though I think it's decades behind in planning and implementation personally (since I saw this coming and knew how to fix it 3 decades ago, but everyone always told me to shut up, but thankfully a few intrepid researchers toiled and plugged along for decades getting solar PV ready, so we have that to be thankful for). Things are coming together. There will be a few bumps along the road, but nothing too major -- not like Davis years.
The sky looked really brown yesterday and today.
As I wrote this, total use dropped 1GW in the last hour since the alerts. Maybe some people reduced their use to respond, as well as sun going down relieving some A/C demand. Wind has also picked up from 0MW to 600MW -- not a whole GW but more than half. This coincided with the last 1.6GW of utility solar PV going to 0 (those must be the ones on bloody trackers pointed toward the sun in almost two axis because the sun just set (unless they fix them for optimal evening catch, except I see the same crazy early rise in sun catching in the mornings too)), so it's a net use drop of only the wind increase amount for now. But it certainly looks like we won't be needing that load shedding like we were alerted to be ready for.
Let's hope this is a typical windier evening than day. With all that heat stored in the Earth's surface, it could rise up and cause some wind. Already up an additional 200MW to 800MW since I wrote the above paragraph. And net use is down 800MW in the last hour. There goes another "close call". Crazy high prices, still too much pollution.
Here's the price maps in the CAISO app:
The highest price on the price map at 7:40PM is GUALALA_6_N001 way up there on the coast North of Santa Rosa at $152.77568/MWh. It shows $12.7735 in congestion pricing (not huge), $117.17625 in energy price (pretty huge), and $22.82593 in losses (which must be why it's the highest price spot).
I'll try to remember to post the (grid side only) Net Use graphs later tonight before they get taken down at midnight. But a word description is easy: it's very hot (air conditioner users), the sun went down (no solar), and there's no wind being caught, so peak use is forecast as 35GW, and net use shot up 3.5GW in 1 hour (10% of use), 5.5GW in 2 hours (15% of use), and 8GW in 3 hours (25% of use), which is a touch more than yesterday, which only saw a peak of 31GW (4GW lower than today), a rise of 6GW in 2 hours (17% of use) (and also a rise of 8GW in 3 hours (26% of use)). So, we have no wind, and we don't know how many people are arriving home right now from long commutes who are having to turn on their air conditioners because they are swealtering.
I have no idea how load planning and dirty energy ramp up planning and abilities are in the supply grid in terms of what's available. Obviously, to avoid clean energy curtailment, they try to shave the dirty energy ramp ups thinner to what's needed so that they don't have to pay for dirty energy to just be running even though there's clean energy available, but today is one of those "firsts" when they sort of get to see a steep evening event with this much heat and collected solar power change (9.8GW on grid to 0), and lack of wind. Think of it: the more sun we get, the more solar power we get and the more heat we get, making both the peak solar power collection and peak power use higher, which makes the points in the net use graph further apart.
This is why we need more Tesla! Let's get running, GigaFactory! Come On Nevada! Make Those PowerPacks and PowerWalls! Or something like that. We also need load shift (potential) pricing exposed far enough into pocketbooks that interested parties buy and install energy storage for integrated use. It's almost as if it couldn't have been timed better with the GF ramp up, even though I think it's decades behind in planning and implementation personally (since I saw this coming and knew how to fix it 3 decades ago, but everyone always told me to shut up, but thankfully a few intrepid researchers toiled and plugged along for decades getting solar PV ready, so we have that to be thankful for). Things are coming together. There will be a few bumps along the road, but nothing too major -- not like Davis years.
The sky looked really brown yesterday and today.
As I wrote this, total use dropped 1GW in the last hour since the alerts. Maybe some people reduced their use to respond, as well as sun going down relieving some A/C demand. Wind has also picked up from 0MW to 600MW -- not a whole GW but more than half. This coincided with the last 1.6GW of utility solar PV going to 0 (those must be the ones on bloody trackers pointed toward the sun in almost two axis because the sun just set (unless they fix them for optimal evening catch, except I see the same crazy early rise in sun catching in the mornings too)), so it's a net use drop of only the wind increase amount for now. But it certainly looks like we won't be needing that load shedding like we were alerted to be ready for.
Let's hope this is a typical windier evening than day. With all that heat stored in the Earth's surface, it could rise up and cause some wind. Already up an additional 200MW to 800MW since I wrote the above paragraph. And net use is down 800MW in the last hour. There goes another "close call". Crazy high prices, still too much pollution.
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