This is what happens when you have way too many government regulations coming from bureaucrats rather than the professions who do this for a living
California’s Battery Problems Heighten Threat of Power Outages
The batteries that help fortify California’s electric grid are kicking in at times when they’re not really needed, draining the power source before more critical junctures and heightening the chances of blackouts as a blistering heat wave punishes the state.
Batteries help to store extra electricity, generated by solar or hydropower. That surplus is supposed to act as a cushion for times when those intermittent renewable sources are running low. But the grid uses a pricing mechanism to trigger the batteries, rather than basing it on pure demand levels. That can lead to mismatches.
That’s exactly what happened on Tuesday, when the state declared a grid emergency and only narrowly avoided major power outages.
Batteries began discharging in the middle of the afternoon, when there was still plenty of solar power and other supplies available to meet electricity demand. That depleted the cushion before it was more critically needed in the early evening, when the state was on the brink of rotating blackouts as demand hit an all-time record and solar supplies started dropping as the sun set. If it weren’t for a timely emergency mobile-phone alert calling on Californians to conserve power immediately, swaths of the state could have been plunged into darkness.
Did not one say at some point “hey, perhaps we should change the usage priority?” If they did, were they shut down?
While blackouts were averted on Tuesday, the battery situation points to a deeper issue with the grid that could continue to exacerbate the risk of outages until it’s resolved. On Wednesday afternoon, the state’s grid operator ratcheted its energy emergency to the second of three levels after 1 p.m. local time and once again warned California could face power shortfalls.
The reason for Tuesday’s earlier-than-expected deployment of batteries likely has to do with market signals. The way the California power market is set up now, energy storage systems are called upon to dispatch by the grid operator when the wholesale power price hits a cap of $1,000 a megawatt-hour, said Cody Hill, senior vice president of battery systems at Rev Renewables, a renewable energy and storage company.
And that is set by government, not the energy companies. Government’s have way, way, way too much control over the energy sector.
Yesterday we rallied together during this historic heatwave. Today, let’s do it again.
We are now in a Flex Alert.
Here’s what to do until 9pm tonight:
– Set thermostats to 78
– Turn off unnecessary lights
– Avoid using large appliances— Gavin Newsom (@GavinNewsom) September 8, 2022
Just wondering, did any reporter go to the governor’s mansion and ask to see the thermostat? See if the lights were on? Using large appliances?
Read: Bummer: California’s Solar Batteries Have Been Kicking In At The Wrong Time »