By: Power Engineering |
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) said it expects to have enough power available to meet peak demand through the fall and winter, even if extreme weather causes it to dip into its planning reserves.
The fall Seasonal Assessment of Resource Adequacy (SARA) projects about 74 GW of generation will be available to serve about 47 GW of anticipated peak demand needs during October and November. ERCOT also expects to have nearly 20 GW of capacity available for operating reserves, but that range could drop below 4,600 MW in an extreme-load and high-outage scenario.
The preliminary winter SARA estimates demand not to exceed 48 GW this winter with 75 GW of generation available to serve anticipated peak demand.
Peak demand for the summer has remained below historical records. Peak so far occurred on Aug. 7 at 67,180 MW, well below the record of 68,305 MW in August 2011.
To read the final Fall SARA, click here.
To read the preliminary winter SARA, click here.