Welcome to Grid Brief! Today we’re looking at power generation and power prices in America’s power markets, with news items where relevant.

What’s Keeping the Lights On?

Let’s start with a snapshot of generation nation-wide:

Total generation grew nation-wide over the week with natural gas at the forefront and nuclear swapping second with wind.

And here’s a map to orient you as we move through the market areas:

CAISO

California had a mild load all week with solar and gas swapping the number one spot with each other.

Yet, despite the low load, CAISO saw real-time price spikes at the five-minute increment in PG&E’s footprint.

New York-ISO

Natural gas, nuclear, and hydro kept the Empire State humming as it moved through a week of low total generation.

And yet day-ahead and real-time prices saw some really rough divergences: in mot areas, day-ahead rarely sat above $40/MWHr regardless of region, but throughout the week in multiple regions, real-time prices punched above $100/MWHr, and sometimes hit nearly $300/MWHr.

The Danish firm Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners has acquired 1.3 GW of New York onshore wind.

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