California grid officials ready to ask for conservation as extreme heat wave approaches
Californians will likely be asked to ease off on the air conditioning — and anything else that consumes electricity — during the heat wave that’s expected to last through Labor Day.
Hoping to avoid blackouts, the California Independent System Operator, which manages the state’s power grid, warned Tuesday that it probably will issue a series of Flex Alerts over the next several days. Flex Alerts are voluntary calls for conservation during the afternoon and evening hours, when energy use tends to soar. Residents will be asked to turn up their thermostats to 78 degrees or higher, avoid using dishwashers or other large appliances, and hold off on charging their electric vehicles, all during the 4-9 p.m. time frame.
Already, the grid manager has issues a “restricted maintenance operations” notice starting Wednesday — a directive telling power generators and transmission line operators to delay routine maintenance that would take generating or transmission equipment offline.
The ISO said temperatures are expected to be 10 to 20 degrees above normal from Wednesday through next Tuesday across California. The peak demand is predicted to surpass 48,000 megawatts Monday, the highest energy usage of the year.
That bleak outlook dovetails with the forecast from the National Weather Service, which says temperatures could hit 114 degrees in parts of the Sacramento Valley on Sunday and Monday.
What makes this heat wave so potentially troublesome is that high temperatures are forecast throughout the West. That will make it harder for California to import electricity supplies from other states, as it frequently does. A shortage of imports contributed to two nights of rolling blackouts in August 2020.
The state narrowly avoided a repeat of those blackouts last summer, when a big wildfire in Oregon temporarily damaged transmission lines and cut off some imports.
The power grid is particularly vulnerable in the evening, as electricity from solar panels tapers off but it’s still so hot that residents keep air conditioners humming. With California positioning itself to ban the sale of gas- and diesel-powered new cars in 2035, some critics have questioned whether the grid can withstand the added demand from millions of electric vehicles being plugged into chargers.
Acknowledging the electrical system’s weaknesses, Gov. Gavin Newsom has asked the Legislature to loan PG&E Corp. up to $1.4 billion to postpone the scheduled 2025 closure of Diablo Canyon, the state’s last nuclear plant. The request is pending in the waning days of this year’s legislative session.
This story was originally published August 30, 2022 at 5:39 PM with the headline "California grid officials ready to ask for conservation as extreme heat wave approaches."