By Scott DiSavino
(Reuters) – Texas’ power grid operator predicts electricity use will break June’s peak demand record on Thursday, before rising further and surpassing July’s record next week, as households and businesses turn on their air conditioners to escape a heat wave.
The extreme weather reminds consumers of the deadly freeze in February 2021 that left millions of Texans without power, water and heat for days, and a brutal heat wave in August 2020 that forced California’s power grid operator to impose rotating outages that affected about 800,000 customers over two days.
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which operates most of the electric grid for 27 million customers, said the system was operating normally with enough supply available to meet expected demand over the next week.
High temperatures in Houston, the state’s largest city, will rise from 95 degrees Fahrenheit (35 Celsius) on Thursday to 99 F on Monday, July 1, according to AccuWeather meteorologists.
While that’s just slightly above the city’s normal maximum temperature of 93 F for this time of year, AccuWeather said it will be more like 108 F on Thursday and 110 F on July 1, considering humidity and other factors.
After breaking peak demand records several times in April and May, ERCOT’s projected power demand would increase from 78,947 megawatts (MW) on Wednesday to 81,027 megawatts (MW) on Thursday, which would surpass the record for 80,787 MW for June established in 2023.
ERCOT forecast demand would reach 83,111 MW on July 1, which would break the record of 83,047 MW for July set in 2023.
The grid’s historic peak was 85,508 MW on August 10, 2023.
Analysts expect ERCOT’s electricity use to surpass an all-time high this summer due to economic and population growth in Texas and rapidly increasing demand for more power from data centers running artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency mining.
One megawatt can power 800 homes on a typical day, but only 250 on a hot summer day in Texas.
Despite the heat, next-day power prices in the ERCOT North Hub, which includes Dallas, fell about 32% to $37 per megawatt-hour on Thursday, below a one-month high of $55 in Wednesday, according to LSEG price data.
This compares to an average of $35 per MWh so far in June, $59 in May, $31 so far this year, $80 in 2023 and $66 in the previous five years (2018-2022).
(Reporting by Scott DiSavino; Editing by Aurora Ellis)
