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The Electric Reliability Council of Texas has asked asking Texans to conserve electricity use on Monday morning.
ERCOT says, due to continued freezing temperatures, very high demand, and unseasonably low wind, operating reserves are expected to be low during the morning hours of Monday prior to the solar ramp up. ERCOT is asking Texans to conserve electricity use, if safe to do so, from 6 a.m. – 10 a.m. ERCOT is expecting similar conditions on Tuesday and will continue to closely monitor conditions and keep the public informed through our communication channels.
Tomorrow’s conservation appeal does not indicate ERCOT is experiencing emergency conditions at this time. At this time, if you are experiencing an outage, ERCOT says it is local in nature and not related to overall grid reliability. Please check with your local electric provider for more information.
Why the Request to Reduce Usage?
- Weather. Most of Texas is seeing extremely cold temperatures for an extended period of time.
- Demand. Texas is experiencing record breaking demand due to the cold weather.
- Solar. Solar generation isn't available in the early morning hours, which is a peak demand time during winter, and slowly ramps up as the sun rises.
- Wind. Wind generation is forecasted to be lower than seasonally expected in the early morning hours.
Peak Demand
- In 2023, January peak demand reached 65,632 MW, with the current all-time peak demand record of 85,508 MW set on August 10, 2023. The all-time winter peak demand record of 74,525 MW was set December 23, 2022, in the 7-8 a.m. hour during Winter Storm Elliott.