Already dealing with power issues and the Democrats are full speed ahead with mandating EVs with zero allowance for adding base production to the grid.

Brilliant!

My sheety apartment ac won't cool below 75 & it runs nonstop all day & most of the night. At night we put out the window unit in the bedroom so it'll cool off enough to sleep.

We close on a house on Friday. I don't even care about $350 electric bills if I'm not sweating while putting things in boxes.

MarathonAg12 said:

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Just plugged in my lava lamp after that comment

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Not the lava lamp.

MarathonAg12 said:

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Just plugged in my lava lamp after that comment

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thanks a lot. Probably why my power just went out. Now I'm sitting in my Prius with the A/C on.

Heat index at 110. Ercot can suck it

85% of our energy from Nat Gas, nuclear, and coal. Not much wind out there.

Screw ERCOT and their sorry crooked asses. They should've been working around the clock on the Texas power grid since the great winter storm fiasco a few years ago but they haven't done *****

Maroon Elephant said:

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Screw ERCOT and their sorry crooked asses. They should've been working around the clock on the Texas power grid since the great winter storm fiasco a few years ago but they haven't done *****

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The grid didn't fail so what are you *****ing about?

The only way ERCOT can incentivize building new power generation is to keep power prices higher. ERCOT does not build, own or operate any power plants

Maroon Elephant said:

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Screw ERCOT and their sorry crooked asses. They should've been working around the clock on the Texas power grid since the great winter storm fiasco a few years ago but they haven't done *****

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Goodness you have a fundamental misunderstanding of ERCOT's function.

Any Dem climate change worshipper who complains when these situations arise, need to be slapped. If Obama or FJBs shadow people had complete control (and they're getting closer), all coal and much of our gas plants would be shut down tomorrow with absolutely no logic or plan whatsoever. Events like these would be the norm and not the exception. Remember the elites will never suffer from their decisions, that's covered.

Texas and Ercot by far are leading the nation in renewable energy generation mix, primarily as a result of Fed subsidies, as it's a no-lose investment. The cost of the backup plan which reasonable people know we need, will be expensive (for all consumers).

If you're a greenie, just shut up and enjoy the misery you're helping create.

Maroon Elephant said:

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Screw ERCOT and their sorry crooked asses. They should've been working around the clock on the Texas power grid since the great winter storm fiasco a few years ago but they haven't done *****

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Politicians are the evil

Is it possible to place a surcharge on new construction permits (both residential and commercial) to pay for generation / grid expansion

Deputy Travis Junior said:

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Just out of curiosity, has the energy chaos of the last few years caused anybody to buy or consider buying solar panels + a battery wall? I lost power for almost a week during the February 2022 mega freeze and never again want to be a slave to the whims of the idiots running these things, so we're buying some to become grid independent.

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so you lost power because of weeklong freeze, and think solar and a battery panel is the answer? Liberal arts major?

Quit ranting about coal generation. It's way out of the money given coal prices vs natural gas on variable cost without even considering coal inefficiency and inflexibility. Capex for coal plant is marginally cheaper than a gas combined cycle unit but economics collapse when you factor in local permitting, let alone Federal. Add in carbon prices and coal is dead, dead, dead for market reasons alone.

Tying into the rest of the grid will cost quite a bit and the market won't support those costs. Making the assumption that neighboring grids always have relatively cheap energy when ERCOT is short is rather silly, and if you tie west Texas and native renewables into the national grid our prices go up.

The new modular nuclear generators are interesting but the US won't permit one until there are several dozen operating elsewhere first.

Wind projects in ERCOT are already hard to get done. Solar added to batteries, with the batteries near load are starting to make economic sense but the volumes are way out of whack.

The balance can't be solved without dispatchable generation. Neither renewables nor coal or nuclear are dispatchable.

Bibendum 86 said:

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Quit ranting about coal generation. It's way out of the money given coal prices vs natural gas on variable cost without even considering coal inefficiency and inflexibility. Capex for coal plant is marginally cheaper than a gas combined cycle unit but economics collapse when you factor in local permitting, let alone Federal. Add in carbon prices and coal is dead, dead, dead for market reasons alone.

Tying into the rest of the grid will cost quite a bit and the market won't support those costs. Making the assumption that neighboring grids always have relatively cheap energy when ERCOT is short is rather silly, and if you tie west Texas and native renewables into the national grid our prices go up.

The new modular nuclear generators are interesting but the US won't permit one until there are several dozen operating elsewhere first.

Wind projects in ERCOT are already hard to get done. Solar added to batteries, with the batteries near load are starting to make economic sense but the volumes are way out of whack.

The balance can't be solved without dispatchable generation. Neither renewables nor coal or nuclear are dispatchable.

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The grid problems could be solved if the Republicans took care of things when they had a majority and gutted the EPA

You're not very bright, are you?

This dude knows what's up

Bibendum 86 said:

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Quit ranting about coal generation. It's way out of the money given coal prices vs natural gas on variable cost without even considering coal inefficiency and inflexibility. Capex for coal plant is marginally cheaper than a gas combined cycle unit but economics collapse when you factor in local permitting, let alone Federal. Add in carbon prices and coal is dead, dead, dead for market reasons alone.

Tying into the rest of the grid will cost quite a bit and the market won't support those costs. Making the assumption that neighboring grids always have relatively cheap energy when ERCOT is short is rather silly, and if you tie west Texas and native renewables into the national grid our prices go up.

The new modular nuclear generators are interesting but the US won't permit one until there are several dozen operating elsewhere first.

Wind projects in ERCOT are already hard to get done. Solar added to batteries, with the batteries near load are starting to make economic sense but the volumes are way out of whack.

The balance can't be solved without dispatchable generation. Neither renewables nor coal or nuclear are dispatchable.

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Yep.

2wealfth Man said:

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Is it possible to place a surcharge on new construction permits (both residential and commercial) to pay for generation / grid expansion

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I admit not being an expert on the wholesale power markets, but some other non-Ercot markets contract to have standby generation capacity. Everyone pays a fee on their bill for these plants to be staffed and ready to put power in the grid. They may only run a few hours per year, but there is a crew there and the equipment is ready to go when needed. The plant owners are paid from these fees for the cost of keeping these plants ready and also get paid for any power they produce.

BTW, the dem talking point that all we have to do is connect ERCOT Texas to the rest of the countries grid and all problems are solved is BS. Shortages happen all over the country and will get worse.

Texasclipper said:

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I admit not being an expert on the wholesale power markets, but some other non-Ercot markets contract to have standby generation capacity. Everyone pays a fee on their bill for these plants to be staffed and ready to put power in the grid. They may only run a few hours per year, but there is a crew there and the equipment is ready to go when needed. The plant owners are paid from these fees for the cost of keeping these plants ready and also get paid for any power they produce.

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ERCOT has an ancillary services market that basically provides standby power. Power plants can bid to provide various types of reserve power to the grid and then get dispatched on short notice to help stabilize supply vs demand.

What ERCOT isn't is a "capacity market" where the power plant gets paid for basically just being there.

The ancillary services market is a capacity market. Look at the ERCOT web site. A/S prices are listed on the ERCOT website as "DAM prices for Capacity". DAM is Day Ahead Market BTW.

Yes it is.... I've lived in texas for almost 50 years. We've never had a problem with triple digit summer numbers. The only problem we have is ERCOT not planning for expanding the grid to match the demand generated by all the green energy nuts moving here.

I say this, and I own an electric car (and a gas truck.) Supply and Demand is a simple concept. People are not saying they won't pay for power are they? Generate more or STFU on your twitter ERCOT.

ERCOT is not empowered to "plan" for generation. That is a supposed free market. ERCOT can only plan for transmission additions (wires).

Wahoo82 said:

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ERCOT is not empowered to "plan" for generation. That is a supposed free market. ERCOT can only plan for transmission additions (wires).

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this has been helpful to understand. My question is when the "market" is distorted (i.e. regulations on pipeline building, requirements for X percentages of renewables, banks and institutions that won't lend due to ESG scores) how do we incentivize new generation.

The other thing is that ercot is not a free market at all. It is a designed market, which has parameters designed to incentivize different behaviors. It "should" result in prices that trigger investment to maintain a targeted amount of overcapacity… around 13% if I recall correctly.

I think the fact that a dispatch and nondispatch MWh are priced the same way is a problem. A large amount of nondispatch capacity is something the system was not designed for and does not correctly account for, in my opinion.

Signel said:

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Yes it is.... I've lived in texas for almost 50 years. We've never had a problem with triple digit summer numbers. The only problem we have is ERCOT not planning for expanding the grid to match the demand generated by all the green energy nuts moving here.

I say this, and I own an electric car (and a gas truck.) Supply and Demand is a simple concept. People are not saying they won't pay for power are they? Generate more or STFU on your twitter ERCOT.

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I've also lived in Texas since '83. Back then we had about 14 million people, now we have about 31 million. I agree that we haven't done all we need to do to keep up with energy production and we need to focus more on Nat Gas and Nuclear which are clean and reliable. I'm also not saying ERCOT is wonderful.

That said I don't think it is an outrage when we get hit with the first big heat wave of the year to ask people to try to conserve a bit so we don't overwhelm the system. Voluntary and Mandatory are very different things.

There are already administrative pricing programs that artificially inflate prices when reserves are low to mimic scarcity pricing in place. This is to put more money in the hands of generators to encourage new development. But why build when you get the money now and additional generation will only supress future scarcity conditions?

A truly free market would have periodic outages that would lead to additional build, but it may have a 2+ year lag during which the system has low generation reserves.

I think it was Ben Franklin who said failing to plan is planning to fail.

We need grid planning for generation and a system to build the correct type of generation resource the market needs when and where it is needed once the free market fails to do so. But the powers that be are strong and well heeled.

Zobel said:

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The other thing is that ercot is not a free market at all. It is a designed market, which has parameters designed to incentivize different behaviors. It "should" result in prices that trigger investment to maintain a targeted amount of overcapacity… around 13% if I recall correctly.

I think the fact that a dispatch and nondispatch MWh are priced the same way is a problem. A large amount of nondispatch capacity is something the system was not designed for and does not correctly account for, in my opinion.

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Boy there is a number that highly manipulated! Yes ERCOT would like to see 13% reserve capacity. 20 years ago this number meant something as it was firm capacity. Now they will show you numbers for reserve capacity that include renewables and we all know that is not firm capacity, so it is smoke and mirrors. Again, not ERCOT's fault, its just the hand they were dealt by the market and the government.

UninformedInternetBlogger said:

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jrdaustin said:

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aggie93 said:

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I don't think it's a conspiracy theory when the temps get above 105 that they ask people to voluntarily use less power.

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This. They'll get people to voluntary conserve to the extent that they can. Beyond that, they'll shed load on a circuit basis.

The limit is the limit. When usage approaches capacity they'll shed load.

And a note of warning from a person in the know... Don't rely on current capacity numbers. Much of the available capacity we see on the grid right now is 70+ years old held together by duct tape and bailing wire and we're at the beginning of the season. By August, a significant percentage of the coal and gas capacity will go offline. Happens every year.

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What part of the grid is 70 years old?

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JB probably has more accurate info, but a quick look shows we have ~3,000MW of Natural Gas generation that was commissioned in the 1950's, and up to another ~4,500MW commissioned in the 60's. Much more in the '70s and '80s.

Also another potential 600MW in hydroelectric capacity (dams) that potentially has equipment dating back that long. Though I understand a portion of that is used for grid balancing more than power generation.

Seeing that this afternoon the ERCOT dashboard shows about a 2500MW spread between expected demand and committed capacity; and, about a 5,000MW spread between expected demand and avialable capacity, a couple of those older generators going offline could eliminate what is already a pretty thin buffer.

Dow chemical recently signed a contract with a company called X-Energy to build small modular nuclear reactors at their Seadrift, Tx facility.

I know that many of the big refining and chemical companies are looking for ways to reduce their carbon footprint and I expect that there will be more of these projects in the future.

It is good to see nuclear back on the table. These new modular designs are much safer, and the modular nature of the design means adding capacity is easy. The big obstacle here is the huge investments that will be needed to transport this power.

If someone is truly a believer in global warming and doesn't support nuclear, then they are willfully ignorant at best, and downright evil at worst because people will die in large numbers without reliable power.