The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, the state鈥檚 grid operator, has said energy could be tight for the next few days.
Temperatures across Texas are expected to climb this week, and that has officials at ERCOT concerned about how increased energy use could create a .
Mose Buchele, who covers energy and the environment for KUT in Austin and hosts the podcast , joined the Standard with more about why and what to expect.
This transcript has been edited lightly for clarity:
Texas Standard: What exactly is this warning that ERCOT sent out last week?
Mose Buchele: I think the important place to start here is that in the springtime, a lot of power plants shut down for scheduled maintenance. They warn the grid operator that they鈥檙e going to shut down to kind of get things ready for the hotter summer months.
And what ERCOT did last Friday was basically tell those power plants, 鈥渉old your roll, don鈥檛 shut down 鈥� we might need you to come online, because it鈥檚 going to be hotter than we thought it would be.鈥�
So you have a combination of the temperatures climbing 鈥� I think it鈥檚 going to be in the high 80s or low 90s in some places across the state. Can you tell me a little bit more about why some of the state鈥檚 power capacity is not online at the moment or might not be online soon?
Yeah, it鈥檚 pretty standard. Basically, in the springtime and in the fall, when we expect milder temperatures than maybe in the summer or winter, power plants do scheduled work. They鈥檒l warn ERCOT that they鈥檙e not going to be available to produce power in order to be online when it gets hotter.
What we鈥檙e seeing is, increasingly, there aren鈥檛 any milder seasons anymore. We鈥檙e getting hotter and hotter springs. We鈥檙e getting extreme heat in the fall as well. And so this normal schedule of things has been interrupted. And people will obviously point to global warming and climate change as the culprit for this.
So last Friday, ERCOT sent out a notice to power plants saying, 鈥渨e said it was okay if you shut down, but actually, we would like you to come back online to be available because we鈥檙e going to see higher temperatures than we typically would.鈥�
And basically what that translates to is that people are going to turn their AC on. There鈥檚 going to be more demand on the grid. And so we need to make sure that the power plants are available to supply electricity to meet that demand.
Now, is that a request by ERCOT? Are they saying pretty please or do they have a hammer of any kind or any authority?
That鈥檚 a great question. They have more of a hammer now than they used to. After the 2021 statewide blackout, ERCOT gave itself more power to command and control these things. ERCOT has the ability to say, 鈥渘o, we need you available and you can do your maintenance some other time when it doesn鈥檛 look like we鈥檒l need you.鈥�
I hasten to add: This is a measure that they鈥檙e taking ahead of time in the event that it might be necessary. We鈥檙e not sure that this is going to be a serious problem now. But, they want to make sure they have this added capacity available in case the demand spikes.
So to me, it sounds like you鈥檙e saying people should monitor this situation. But are we going to get into a scenario where ERCOT is asking people to not use their appliances or cut power or something like that, as we鈥檝e seen before?
Yeah, I was just online this morning. And, as things stand right now, I wouldn鈥檛 imagine we鈥檙e going to get any conservation requests.
If they start seeing demand get close to the amount of power that can be supplied by the grid, they would request that people try to conserve electricity.
Well, the really hot weather is, unfortunately, not too far away from us. So is this any signal of what鈥檚 to come this summer? Or is it just circumstances of the current situation that resulted in this alert?
This raises a lot of questions because ERCOT has traditionally planned around the hottest days of the summer. That鈥檚 when we need power plants and all energy generators to be available.
And if you start seeing situations where these facilities can鈥檛 shut down for maintenance in what used to be the milder times of year to prepare for the summer, then people start to worry about what will happen in the summer when we get these super extreme hot days.
If the power plants aren鈥檛 ready for that because they haven鈥檛 been allowed to prepare for it, that has raised concern, and it does raise concern.
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