USA: the largest electricity grid operator declares an emergency
A heat wave continues to hit the Midwest, Northeast and South through the end of the week, forcing the largest US network operator to declare a Level 1 emergency for Thursday. That's because tens of millions of people are turning on their air conditioners to escape the scorching temperatures of summer in the northern hemisphere.
On Wednesday evening, PJM Interconnection LLC declared a Level 1 energy emergency in 13 states ranging from Illinois to New Jersey, serving more than 65 million customers. PJM is concerned about maintaining adequate energy reserves on Thursday as energy demand is set to soar due to air conditioners. The area also affects Washington DC. Demand is expected to reach 153,286 megawatts as of 5 PM and generating capacity is approximately 186,000 megawatts.
The grid's energy mix shows that natural gas, coal and nuclear are doing most of the heavy lifting as of 0600 ET. Electricity prices on the grid appear normal, although particularly expensive in urban areas of Washington DC
The spike in above-average temperatures for the average East Coast area is expected to peak on Friday and return to normal levels for this time of year. Average temperatures over the 5-10-30 years show that Northern Hemisphere summer has peaked, according to Bloomberg data.
The reliability of the PJM network has deteriorated considerably with the attempt to apply green energy sources to an old and obsolete network, which would require large investments. But nobody wants to pay
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The article USA: the largest electricity grid operator declares emergency comes from Scenari Economici .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/usa-il-piu-grande-operatore-di-rete-elettrica-dichiara-lemergenza/ on Fri, 28 Jul 2023 06:00:52 +0000.