No More Power, Americans Warned
Uh-oh!
In a surprising turn of events, Texans have just been warned by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) to begin conserving energy starting Monday afternoon and evening because there will not be enough wind power to properly operate the power grid during peak energy demand hours.
According to Breitbart, While Texas is very well known for its massive role in the oil industry, the state is also the leading producer of wind energy as well. In inclement weather such as snow storms, in the past Texans have lost electricity because the wind turbines have frozen.
Now it appears similar problems are likely to occur because of extreme heat and calm wind conditions.
The ERCOT explained, “With extreme hot weather driving record power demand across Texas, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) is issuing a Conservation Appeal, asking Texans and Texas businesses to voluntarily conserve electricity, Monday, July 11 between 2-8 p.m. ERCOT also issued a Watch for a projected reserve capacity shortage from 2-8 p.m. At this time, no system-wide outages are expected.”
They further explained their request by noting:
- Record high electric demand. The heat wave that has settled on Texas and much of the central United States is driving increased electric use. Other grid operators are operating under similar conservative operations programs as ERCOT due to the heatwave.
- Low wind. While solar power is generally reaching near full generation capacity, wind generation is currently generating significantly less than what it historically generated in this time period. Current projections show wind generation coming in less than 10 percent of its capacity.
