Duck-Curves Are Back -- And WorseThan Ever -- June 21, 2023

Locator: 44991COSTRENEWABLES. 

Duck-curves:

• ectric rates will only get higher and higher due to this phenomenon.
• released for publication today by the EIA. Link here. 

ERCOT: easily held yesterday --

• yesterday was the narrowest to date this summer and will be the last day of concern for this brief warm spell
• but, wow, it was expensive

Guyana: it's all yours. Thank you, very much for your hospitality.

• Exxon discusses returning unexplored offshore oil blocks to Guyana -- Oilprice.

WTI: current decline -- about 41% -- "consistent with "some of the largest drops in history" -- Liz Sonders. 

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Back to the Bakken

Indian Hill: a reader sent me this photo last evening. Taken from a KUMV webcam, looking south. Williston, of course, is in the foreground; a flare on Indian Hill is in the background, far left. Will post again, later, as a stand-alone with further notes.

WTI: $71.21.

Thursday, June 22, 2023: 37 for the month; 145 for the quarter, 400 for the year
None.

Wednesday, June 21, 2023: 37 for the month; 145 for the quarter, 400 for the year
39304, conf, CLR, Meadowlark FIU 9-6H1,

RBN Energy: Enbridge poised for success following Mainline tariff settlement as TMX startup looms.

It took a while, but Enbridge and shippers on its 3.2-MMb/d Mainline system have finally reached an agreement in principle on a new tolling agreement that will lower per-barrel rates on the mammoth crude oil pipeline network between Western Canada and the U.S. Midwest — and also help ensure that Enbridge will earn a healthy rate of return on its largest asset.

Assuming the Mainline Tolling Agreement (MTA) is approved by Canadian regulators later this year (and that’s seems to be a safe bet), the new rate structure should also help the Mainline system retain the vast majority of its crude volumes, even as it faces new competition from the Trans Mountain Expansion (TMX) project, which will provide 590 Mb/d of additional pipeline capacity from Edmonton, AB, to the British Columbia (BC) coast starting sometime next year. In today’s RBN blog, we discuss the MTA and what it means for Enbridge, shippers and TMX.

ERCOT Texas Update -- Late Afternoon -- Tuesday, A Work Day -- June 20, 2023

Locator: 44985ENERGY.
Locator: 44985COSTRENEWABLES.
Locator: 44985ELECTRICITY.

Update

Later, 5:42 p.m. CT: just show consumers the cost of electricity and they will cut back.

 Original Post

Link here.

Uff-Da -- If Any Kennedy Grandchildren Have Not Seen Snow, May We Suggest ... Spring In Norway? -- March 11, 2019

Note: Mark Perry's Monday afternoon links are all "energy and the environment."  Be sure to take a look at the argument that California's solar energy policies may be responsible for the big forest fires. It goes back to the "DUCK" curves. I even have tags for "DuckCurve" and "Ducks_Solar."

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Skogmurmeldyr

Wow, this global warming isn't sparing anyone this year. Over at IceAgeNow, "Forget spring! Norway bracing for half a meter of snow!"

Now a half meter of snow over southern Norway, announced Håvard Thorset, meteorologist at the Norwegian Meteorological Institute.

Much of this will come in the middle of rush hour traffic. The worst will be southern Norway and the capital.

Eastern Norway and Oslo will get some snow in the afternoon rush hour on Tuesday. The worst is expected Tuesday into Wednesday.

 Pretty funny. All this snow. One of the Kennedys -- was it Patrick? -- predicted our grandchildren would never see snow again.

Speaking of which, our three grandchildren are spending spring break in Utah ... skiing.

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Mismarck, ND
Most Snowfall Ever In A 24-Hour Period

Be sure to view the video, linked below.

Closer to home, but no alpine skiing -- but the cross country skiing should be great, as well as snowmobiling.

This is amazing: Bismarck, ND, broke a century-old record of snowfall. Truly, truly amazing, and this comes from a former NoDak.

Also from IceAgeNow:

See video of Mismarck, ND -- where I was born. I lived in Bismarck for two years before moving to Williston, ND.

Residents growing tired of the snow ... and this is North Dakota. LOL.

Hypocrisy Is Spelled H-Y-P-O-C-R-I-S-Y -- December 23, 2017

Updates

December 26, 2017: China's natural gas consumption soars. From oilprice.com.

Chinese natural gas consumption surged through the first 11 months of 2017, up 19 percent year-on-year.

China is the third largest consumer of natural gas in the world, behind the U.S. and Russia, and is expected to show the strongest demand growth over the coming decades—propelling it to second place by 2040.

As the nation's industrial and residential sectors pivot away from coal (think: smog), natural gas demand is going through the roof, with domestic Chinese LNG prices reaching a six-year high in recent weeks.

One data point that highlights these tightening fundamentals is how CNOOC just rented a convoy of 100 trucks to transport LNG thousands of kilometers to northern regions in China to fill supply gaps.

Driven by this recent rampant rise, China is now the second-largest importer of LNG globally. Spiking demand has lifted Northeast Asian spot LNG prices above $10/MMBtu.

Natural gas consumption: US, Russia, China, and then India, I suppose. That tells met that India is using a lot of coal (as is China, of course).

Original Post

North Texas. Yesterday was cold, windy, rainy -- it completely reminded me of southern Scotland in winter. We were told to expect more of the same today.

It was a bit cool taking Sophia to gymnastics and then swimming this morning, but when we left the education and training center about noon, it was a beautiful day: bright sunshine, no wind, and fairly warm.

Now (about 4:00 p.m.CT) it's short-sleeve weather and not a cloud in the sky. Our older granddaughter says our e-mail will be slower today since "everything is now in the cloud," and THE cloud is nowhere to be seen today. Yesterday, with all the clouds, she said, our e-mail moved very, very quickly.

Speaking of which, I'm told that iPhones use slightly more power on nights when there are full moons. To protect the iPhones, Apple will throttle back the processing time of older iPhones to conserve battery power when the moon is full. Apple says that most people won't notice it but if they do it will be rare, usually only once in a blue moon, or 1.16699016 x 10-8 hertz.

I assume Apple is making the announcement to fend off class-action lawsuits.

Whatever.

All I know is it's great bicycling weather and that's what I'm doing -- but stopping now for a Coke and a bit  of blogging.

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ISO Watch (Or Is It ISO-Ouch?

ISO New England: spot price for electricity surged to almost $250/MWh earlier this morning and $150 this afternoon, but is now (6:34 p.m. ET) down to about $50/MWH. How's that renewable energy working out?

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Global Warming

Global warming. Both China and the UK are experiencing incredibly cold winters. I mentioned China's winter a few weeks ago and now I'm hearing about the weather in the UK. We've talked about this many times over the years. If I find the old posts, I will link them but I'm not going to go looking for them. The articles today (sent by various readers):

• China's LNG imports surge to record amid winter heating crunch, from Bloomberg, December 22, 2017 --
• LNG imports rise 53% y/y to a record 4 million tons
• November LNG pipeline supplies up 27% to 2.5 million tons
• coldest winter in five years has been forecast for Britain, from The Daily [London] Star, December 23, 2017
• it's a bit difficult making sense of the article as written, so I won't say anything but post the link.
• this article and headline are a bit easier to understand. From The [London] Express, November 28, 2017: Britain is facing "snowmageddon" as La Nina to bring Big Freeze. 
• Britain's Christmas weather 2017 is set to be the harshest for years thanks to a freak phenomenon in the world's biggest ocean. Two comments:

I did not see England's most famous analyst mention the forecast for such a harsh British winter; if John Kemp tweeted it, I missed it.

Thank goodness for global warming to provide a bit of warming effect on this very, very cold weather to hit Great Britain ... and just when things seemed to be going so well.

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Synonyms: Hypocrisy, Fake News

Bird Brains

Killing eagles. This is my world view of the laws protecting migratory birds:

• for two centuries (1781 to 1981) the US had the strictest and best-enforced laws in the world to protect migratory birds
• era of Algore: California piloted the advancement of the wind power industry. Between 1981 and 1986, 15,000 turbines producing more than 1,000 MW of power were installed in the state
• in December, 2016, the Obama administration officially announced that individual wind-energy companies that plan to operate the technology for up to 30 years, will be allowed to kill up to 4,200 of the birds without liability. See also Scientific American, in which it was noted that the bill did not limit killings to wind farms: the permits can be sought by "all sources of human-caused eagle mortality," including oil and gas exploration and production, mining, military bases, airports, cell towers and utility lines
• on December 23, 2017, the Trump administration did away with the need for permits and re-interpreted the Federal laws to say that "accidentally killing migratory birds not a crime."

I have no dog in this fight. It is what it is, but considering that slicers and dicers, and solar fryers kill tens of thousands of more birds than any oil site, this bill is clearly a huge win for the renewable energy sector. It also provides a lot of "coverage" for USAF air bases. I know there were more than a few Air Force commanders that wanted to kill the Canadian geese pooping on military golf courses.

It was not hard to see this one coming. Either it's legal or not legal to kill migratory birds accidentally, but one energy industry cannot be held to a different standard than another energy industry.

However this issue plays out -- I assume it will end up in court -- it's going to be entertaining to watch the Sierra Club thread this needle.

Later: now that unlimited bird strikes are allowed, maybe this wind farm developer will re-consider. Back on December 18, 2017, Penn Energy reported that an energy company has cancelled plans for a wind farm in central Montana, blaming the regulators, saying the regulators set the price too high to make the project unfeasible. TransAlta has scrapped the 21-megawatt farm near Martinsdale after regulators approved a price of $23.30 per megawatt hour. The Calgary-based company wanted more than $43 per megawatter hour for the power. Consumers wanted a price of .... drum roll ... $13.96. 

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Short Takes

Montana: I heard on the radio yesterday that the electricity grid is still pretty much shut down in Puerto Rico.

One wonders if this would have been resolved by now if that Montana company had been allowed to simply complete their job and not told to leave the island by the US Congress. Just wondering. I know anything Montana folks set their minds to will get it done. I have personal experience. As a high school wrestler our Williston team wrestled teams from Montana and North Dakota. The only teams that "terrified" me were the Montana teams.

Back to that Chinese winter story, in case the link is broken. It's an important story on so many levels:

The world’s largest energy user -- that would be CHINA -- is facing a winter supply crunch after demand surged this year amid President Xi Jinping’s fight against smog, which has focused on cutting the use of coal in favor of cleaner-burning gas. 

Parts of the country started facing shortages just two weeks into winter, with Hebei and Shandong provinces in the north and central Hubei reporting supply shortfalls last month and curtailing supplies to businesses and factories in order to keep homes warm. 

Spot LNG prices in Northeast Asia rose this week to $10.90 per million British thermal units, the highest in three years. China’s top economic planner last week reiterated its call for gas suppliers should speed up LNG imports to meet winter demand. 

And I thought wind energy and solar energy was going to solve all the world's energy problems. Silly me. 

The California Duck Curve -- Re-Visited -- March 6, 2017

See if you can find the word "dispatch" as in "dispatchable" on this page. 

This is pretty cool. This has to do with the post of just a couple of days ago regarding $1,000 / MWH electricity in California (vs the typical $30 / MWH cost). We've talked about incredibly high spikes in the cost of electricity in New England during the winter due to misguided energy policies; I forget, but I think we were talking of $300 - $800 / MWH spikes in price that can often occur overnight during cold snaps in New England.

In California, because of the reliance on solar and wind energy, those spikes can go upwards of $1,000/MWH.

Today, a reader sent me this link from The Economist of all things. Bottom line is this:

• California peak electricity use is between 3:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m.
• solar energy "prematurely" peaks out at noon
• peak wind energy doesn't kick in until later in the evening /night

This is called a "duck curve." We talked about the "CALIFORNIA DUCK CURVE" on October, 22, 2015.

That was from Bloomberg. It looks like the folks over at The Economist finally got around to reporting it.

What A California Duck Looks Like -- RBN Energy -- July 25, 2016

From RBN Energy:

This spring, as Californians enjoyed their famously pleasant sunny weather, implied heat rates averaged below 4.0. With heat rates that low, the Pacific Northwest and Desert Southwest reduced the power being sent to California.  During the summer months, however, the load profile is high enough during the middle of the day that both imports and less expensive natural gas units within California are needed to balance the grid.  That means that the impact on gas demand can really swing widely during the day, depending on the season.

There are so many story lines here. I see them as great news for natural gas; the Midcontinent fuel fossil story; and, investors if they pay attention.

I see really, really bad news for utilities if they don't get a handle on this, and hydroelectricity. Nuclear energy in California is already dead. 

The "Duck Curve" In California -- October 22, 2015

We may have DUCs in North Dakota, but California has a "Duck Curve," as reported by BloombergBusiness.

This is the "Duck Curve":

What's going on?

When the sun starts to set in California, there’s one thing you can count on: thousands of megawatts of natural gas-fired power plants quickly firing up to keep the state lit.

It’s a daily phenomenon that will become more pronounced than ever this winter as California’s ambitious clean energy goals have boosted the state’s use of renewables. The surge in intermittent solar power will test the statewide electricity grid because it exacerbates the need for alternative sources such as gas outside of daylight hours. Regulators have warned it’ll make California more vulnerable to price spikes and power disruptions.

It works like this: As the day begins to wane in the Golden State, generation from solar panels drops off. That occurs just when consumers returning home from work turn on appliances and flip on lights, driving up electricity consumption. Other power supplies are needed to fill the gap and the need is more urgent in winter when days are shorter.

The phenomenon known as the “duck curve” is so named for the resemblance of the demand slope to the profile of a water fowl. The California grid’s need to call on gas-fired plants to balance shifts in demand and supply shows the potential hazards of tying more renewable generation to power networks.

My hunch: we'll see some days when glitches in computer software upgrades lead to some interesting blackouts. Blackouts, not brownouts.