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News
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LCG, August 14, 2024 – LCG Consulting (LCG) has released its annual outlook of the ERCOT wholesale electricity market for 2025, highlighting the region's rapid transition toward increased reliance on renewable energy resources and battery storage.
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LCG, August 14, 2024 – LCG Consulting (LCG) has released its annual outlook of the ERCOT wholesale electricity market for 2025, highlighting the region's rapid transition toward increased reliance on renewable energy resources and battery storage.
Read more
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Industry News
California Capsule: It's Summer, and the Lights are On
LCG, June 21, 2001It's the first day of summer, the longest day of the year, and it's going to be hot in California this afternoon, with temperatures of 103F predicted for Bakersfield in the south-central part of the state and 101F for Redding, up north near Mt. Shasta.But the California Independent System operator, which had a hard time finding 33,000 megawatts in its control area last January, figures there will be about 43,000 megawatts available to handle today's predicted peak demand of 40,049 megawatts.At 4:00 p.m., when the ISO expects the system to experience its severest test, a predicted 42,970 megawatts of "reliable" generation is predicted to be available, giving the grid operators a cushion of 2,921 megawatts, or 7.3 percent enough to prevent any sort of power emergency declaration.Where did all the power come from? Certainly not from the scads of new power plants California Gov. Gray Davis has announced as the work of his administration. Most of those plants won't be in production for a year or more.Cal-ISO says only 3,222 megawatts of production is expected to be off-line this afternoon, a tribute to the maintenance efforts of the much-maligned independent power producers who have been getting their facilities ready for a summer of power shortages.In January, when as much as 15,000 megawatts might be off-line at any time, state officials charged the power producers with deliberately withholding generation in order to drive up prices. Regulators descended on power plants for unscheduled visits in an attempt to catch generators cutting bait when the could have been fishing. The companies said at the time they had run the plants hard all the previous summer and had to fix them before this summer.Though the power situation looks good for today, things could get worse because of the state's chronic imbalance between supply and demand. The record for demand in the state was set July 12, 1999, when Californians consumed 45,884 megawatts of power. On a day like that, there will be blackouts.The state's energy czar Richard Sklar is aware of that. "We are not out of the woods," he said. "We are not out of the woods on price and we are not out of the woods on availability."State officials may get a taste today of the effect of Monday's decision by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to impose price controls full time on 11 Western states."Everyone is very interested to see how (today) unfolds, price-wise and supply-wise," said Stephanie McCorkle, a spokeswoman for Cal-ISO.Davis Demands Refunds from Power producersGov. Davis, deprived by FERC's Monday action of his favorite rate caps topic, told a U.S. Senate panel yesterday that Congress should pressure federal regulators to order power producers to pay California nearly $9 billion in refunds."It is unconscionable for the generators to profit from their egregious overcharges," Davis told theSenate Governmental Affairs Committee.Davis told the panel that a Cal-ISO analysis showed the state was billed $8.9 billion more than the competitive market would have warranted for power deliveries for the 13 months ending June 1. FERC has ordered reviews of around $124 million in possible overcharges but has yet to order refunds.Two commissioners who are sympathetic to the charge that the power producers overcharged for electricity said that California officials and energy companies should be given a chance to settle the multibillion-dollar refund dispute in the next three weeks before the commission acts, according to the Washington Post."We should have given (the California parties) guidance on refunds," Massey told the Post. "A goodplace to start was to take (Monday's) order and apply it starting October 2000 and see what you get" inrefunds.That was the same Massey who last December 15 said "Some day soon a federal court, when asked, will declare that utilities are entitled to recover these high wholesale costs from their customers." About two-thirds of Davis' $8.9 billion was run up by the state's two largest utilities, Pacific Gas & Electric Co. and Southern California Edison Co., and has forced both into insolvency.Democrats on Sen. Joe Lieberman's committee were friendly to Davis, but Republicans laid much of the blame for California's problems squarely on the governor's shoulders. "How did you let things get totally out of hand?" asked Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee, the committee's senior Republican.Republicans also warned that the vitriolic rhetoric employed by Davis would deter power producers from investing in the state, thus exacerbating the basic cause of California's energy problems, the insufficiency of generation resources.State Tax Board Moves to Squeeze Power PlantsThe California Board of Equalization on Wednesday moved closer yesterday to stripping county governments of their authority levy property taxes on power plants. Under the state's electric deregulation scheme, such taxing authority was transferred to the counties on the premise that non-regulated power plants were just like other businesses. State Controller Kathleen Connell, a member of the board, proposed that the state take over theassessments because the state could collect $70 million to $100 million more than local governments, which are limited by Proposition 13.The board gave its unanimous but tentative approval to the plan, which is opposed by the counties and is certain to draw fire from companies which have invested in power plants on the basis of state laws they thought would remain constant.
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UPLAN-NPM
The Locational Marginal Price Model (LMP) Network Power Model
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UPLAN-ACE
Day Ahead and Real Time Market Simulation
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UPLAN-G
The Gas Procurement and Competitive Analysis System
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PLATO
Database of Plants, Loads, Assets, Transmission...
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