Texas Heat And Wind: Lots Of Hot Air -- July 19, 2018

Updates

July 23, 2018, from SeekingAlpha --

• Sempra Energy's  SoCalGas issued a natural gas curtailment watch today, telling customers to be prepared to reduce gas use if needed, with power generators expected to work harder than usual to keep air conditioners humming as a heat wave blankets Southern California
• high temperatures in Los Angeles are forecast to top 90 degrees F every day this week, including 97 on Wednesday, while the normal high in the city at this time of year is 84
• SoCalGas projects gas demand will rise from 3B cf/day toay to 3.B on Tuesday and 3.2B on Wednesday, while receipts of the fuel via pipelines into California are expected to total only ~2.6B cf/day each day, meaning the utility would need to tap storage fields to make up the difference, which could hurt SoCal’s ability to stockpile enough fuel to avoid curtailments for some power and industrial customers on the coldest days during the winter heating season

Later, 3:17 p.m. CDT: California next! From SeekingAlpha -

• Sempra Energy's SoCalGas issues a natural gas curtailment watch for Southern California, with power generators expected to burn more fuel than usual to keep air conditioners humming ahead of an anticipated heat wave [can't they spin the wind turbines faster; turn on the solar panels all night?] 
• although high temperatures in Los Angeles were expected to remain near normal levels of ~84 degrees F through Sunday, readings are forecast to jump into the low 90s during much of next week
• SoCalGas supplies are expected to remain tight this summer and winter due to reduced availability from the Aliso Canyon storage facility following the massive 2015-16 leak and ongoing shutdowns of several pipelines  

Original Post

Posted earlier:

Texas heat: Texas sets back-to-back electricity demand records, and likely to keep setting new records -- summer is just beginning here in Texas. Electricity demand in Texas dwarfs that of California. Amazing.

• DFW hit 106 late Wednesday afternoon -- but it was a dry heat
• Love Field, downtown Dallas, hit 107
• Spinks Airport, Ft Worth, hit 108
• yesterday, a new record, between 4 and 5 p.m.: 72,192 MW
• yesterday, one hour earlier: also set a record -- broken one hour later
• both of those records topped the August, 2016, mark of 71,110 MW
• California demand record was around 54,000 MW set some years ago

Now, let's look at wind production:

Energy demand today hit 61,195 MW at noon, Texas time, and will continue to rise through late afternoon. During this period, when demand will near/exceed 70,000 MW -- how much energy will all that wind capacity supply? About 3,000 MW.

Note: wind-produced electricity will fall even farther tomorrow.  And not by a trivial amount. Fossil fuel utility plants will need to be up and running well before increased demand becomes reality; incredibly inefficient -- even while wind is providing electricity, fossil-fuel plants need to be running in the background to ensure "viability" of the electric grid.

Link for graphic below:

At the nadir, 42,000 MW, wind provides a significant amount, upwards of 15,000 MW, but it's not dependable, and fossil fuel plants need to be running in the background to ensure the grid "holds."

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Proof That The Texas Grid Is Holding