Texas Power Plants Are Operational 24/7. Texas Heat Drives Record Highs in Power Demand. What Could Go Wrong?

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HNewsWire: Texas power plants are operating nonstop as a result of the state's extreme heat.

ERCOT, a Texas-based company, now uses conservation alerts routinely rather than just in extreme emergencies. The design of the system itself, which lacks adequate capacity to keep up with load growth, is the issue rather than the weather.

Because of the extreme heat in Texas, the state's grid operator is directing facilities to operate at a historically high rate, often pushing them to postpone maintenance in order to maintain producing energy. For the time being, this has helped keep the lights on, but the short-term perspective is straining a system that is already close to breaking point.

Officials have twice in the last week urged Texans to use less energy in the sweltering afternoons as demand veered dangerously close to exceeding supply. According to Michele Richmond, executive director of Texas Competitive Power Advocates, a generator industry organization, there are already mounting worries about how long power plants can sustain the strenuous pace while they work constantly.

Things would shatter, as predicted. We are working harder than ever before with an aged fleet.

Ercot, the grid operator, is largely relying on a system called reliability unit pledges to make sure there is adequate supply to satisfy the spike in demand for electricity. Regular orders are given for plants to start up or keep running while skipping any necessary maintenance. The legislation also supersedes any interruptions due to problems with the economy or anything else. And as the state confronts wave after wave of catastrophic weather, Ercot is applying the rule more than ever before.

In the first half of this year, the operator, officially known as the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, requested 2,890 hours of RUCs over the whole system. Data from Ercot's independent market monitor given by Richmond shows that this is more than quadruple the 801 hours in the first half of 2021. 2020 as a whole saw 224 RUC hours.

The issue, according to Richmond, is that postponing maintenance now will probably come back to bite owners of power plants.

When plants start to fail, she said, "if you put off preventive maintenance because it's necessary for dependability, it increases the likelihood you'll require a more extensive outage." Population Growth and Crypto

The circumstance demonstrates that the Texas system is depending on band-aid fixes for what is likely to become a long-term issue. The state is coping with an increase in demand due to a population rise. The growth of cryptocurrency mining over the last year has also brought with it the sector's power-intensive processes. In the meanwhile, climate change has increased the likelihood and severity of extreme weather events that increase power demand, leading to circumstances like a lethal freeze in February 2021 that resulted in outages across the state.

Interim CEO of Ercot, Brad Jones, is conscious of the precarious position he is in. On the one hand, adopting RUCs has allowed the operator to avoid announcing grid emergencies six times in the previous year. Or, as Public Utility Commission of Texas Chairman Peter Lake said at a hearing on June 22: Six occasions when the system would have otherwise been "on the edge of rolling blackouts."

Jones claims he is aware, nevertheless, that pushing facilities to remain in operation increases the likelihood of malfunctions. Boiler-tube leaks, for instance, are a major issue at this time of year, particularly at older facilities. Even while these leaks don't usually need an emergency plant shutdown, if they aren't constantly watched, they may result in larger, more expensive repairs.

Jones said in an interview that "usually a generator can function for a long with the water leaking." "How much time is that?" is the query. According to Jones, the grid operator keeps in touch with generators and attempts to give them space to conduct necessary repairs when circumstances allow. Regulators are attempting to find a mechanism to implement the state's ultimate requirement for new power plants, he added.

According to Michael Webber, an energy resources expert at the University of Texas in Austin, Ercot and other operators are dealing with two problems. The spring and autumn are the most common times for businesses to plan maintenance because of the pleasant weather and generally reduced energy demand. However, because to climate change, these periods of moderate weather are becoming less frequent. For instance, this year's early May heat wave made it necessary for certain generators to postpone tune-ups. Additionally, hot spells are lasting longer, which puts extra strain on power plants that are operating nonstop for weeks at a time.

According to Webber, who is also the chief technology officer of Energy Impact Partners, a clean tech startup fund, maintenance for power plants, particularly older ones, may be time-consuming and difficult. He answered, "I guess you have to take the facility down." "You can't finish it in a few of hours." The state's outdated fleet makes everything worse. In Texas, coal-powered facilities are typically 50 years old, whereas natural gas plants are typically 30 years old. The desire for relaxation and recovery is similar to that of people, according to Webber. "We can collapse if we run at full speed for a while."

HNewsWire: Some of the most influential political figures in the nation failed to distribute money properly, which led to the recent outages of the electric system. There are certain individuals who need to answer for their actions, and I think the continuing grid issue will result in big changes after the next election.

As a heatwave stressed power supplies for the second time this week, Texas' power grid operator took emergency measures and ordered consumers to conserve electricity on Wednesday afternoon to prevent rolling blackouts.

Instead of the 18-hour warning for Monday, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) issued messages to consumers three hours before 1400 local time to limit electricity.

ERCOT attributed the absence of wind and solar energy and the record-high electric demand on Wednesday's conservation appeal, which burned the state.

According to Reuters, energy-intensive businesses like Japanese manufacturer Toyota Motor Corp. reduced output at its San Antonio factory in order to save energy.

A Toyota representative said that beginning immediately and lasting through August, the San Antonio factory may halt production before 1400 local time on weekdays and cut night shifts.

Another business in the region decreasing electricity to assist the grid's rebalancing efforts is Samsung Electronics Co Ltd.

Samsung said in a statement on Thursday that it was "actively watching the weather conditions, coordinating with local authorities, and will change our preparations appropriately."

At the Arlington facility of General Motors Co., which manufactures full-size SUVs for the Chevrolet, GMC, and Cadillac brands, air conditioners have been reduced to save energy.

One of the largest US refineries, LyondellBasell's Houston facility processes 268,000 barrels of heavy-sulfur crude per day, producing refined products like premium grades of gasoline, jet fuel, and ultra-low sulfur diesel, according to sources who spoke to Reuters. By switching from electric pumps to steam turbines, the refinery reduced its energy consumption.

SRH: The problem is not the weather but the system design itself, insufficient capacity to match load growth, and failure to operate the network within conservative limits. The possible insufficiency of ERCOT’s generation margin this summer was identified by regulators in a review two months ago (“Summer reliability assessment”, North American Electric Reliability Corporation, May 18).

To a large extent, the problem has reflected a long-term political choice to operate an energy-only rather than a capacity market in the state to keep costs down.

The energy-only market provides cheaper electricity on average but at the cost of recurrent shortages leading to appeals for conservation and sometimes blackouts.

ERCOT has come to rely on conservation alerts as a normal operating procedure rather than exceptional emergency measure. Periodic conservation appeals and the risk of occasional blackouts have been the price for keeping generating capacity lean and costs down; conservation appeals have become a feature rather than a bug.

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