EnergyOnline
Services

RSS FEED

EnergyOnline.com rss

News

SPP's Western Expansion Set for Implementation on April 1

LCG, March 13, 2026--The Southwest Power Pool (SPP) announced yesterday that leaders from the participating organizations voted unanimously to proceed as planned with expanding its regional transmission organization (RTO) services into the Western Interconnection. SPP sees the decision to proceed as planned as a strong signal of confidence as SPP and its partner utilities prepare for this key milestone, which will occur overnight between March 31 and April 1.

Read more

Entergy Estimates Customer Savings of $5B from "Fair Share Plus" Data Center Agreements

LCG, March 6, 2026--Entergy yesterday announced approximately $5 billion in total savings for 2.3 million customers in Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi resulting from data center customer agreements in those states. Entergy, which completed its first data center customer agreement in 2024, projects the customer savings over the next 20 years and after the regulatory approval or acknowledgement of the public service commissions in those states.

Read more

Industry News

State Squeezes Through Another Hot Day

LCG, Aug. 2, 2000--The California Independent System Operator declared its daily Stage 2 "Power Watch" yesterday and is likely to do so again today, but so far during this five-day heat wave, the state has squeezed through with power to spare.

If a reserve margin of about 2 percent can be called "power to spare."

Peak demand on the statewide electrical grid yesterday was 45,503 megawatts and Cal-ISO said it expects that to increase to 45,723 megawatts today. Those figures are awfully close to the state record of 45,884 megawatts, set on July 12 of last year.

Cal-ISO has three levels of power watch. When reserves look like they are going to be tight, a Stage 1 power watch is called, and customers are asked to reduce their electricity consumption by drying the laundry at midnight and setting the air-conditioner thermostat a notch higher.

If that doesnt do the trick, Cal-ISO will declare a Stage 2 power watch, like yesterday and today. Stage 2 involves service interruption to customers with interruptible power contracts with their utilities.

If demand exceeds available capacity, a Stage 3 power watch would be called. Involuntary service interruptions, or rolling blackouts, would begin and wouldnt stop until the emergency had passed.

Cal ISO hasnt had to call a Stage 3 emergency, but all it would take is one big power plant to trip off line, or a high voltage transmission line to short out to a tree.

California imports about a quarter of its power from other states, over high voltage transmission lines. In the summer of 1996, one of those lines in Oregon shorted out to a tree. The load was shifted to other lines and they shut down. Pretty soon, power plants in California began shutting down to protect themselves. This all happens automatically.

Eventually, in that incident four years ago, a massive power outage affected the 13 western states.

Copyright © 2026 LCG Consulting. All rights reserved. Terms and Copyright
UPLAN-NPM
The Locational Marginal Price Model (LMP) Network Power Model
Uniform Storage Model
A Battery Simulation Model
UPLAN-ACE
Day Ahead and Real Time Market Simulation
UPLAN-G
The Gas Procurement and Competitive Analysis System
PLATO
Database of Plants, Loads, Assets, Transmission...
CAISO CRR Auctions
Monthly Price and Congestion Forecasting Service