Is it excess demand or inadequate supply?
On July 1st in the midst of the heatwave, CBS New York reported that Mayor DeBlasio and energy supplier Consolidated Edison were pleading for New Yorkers to limit their demand for electricity as a power outage struck the city.
Source: Twitter
Twitter was quick to react to the news. One commentator pointed out that while the media were keen to link outages with the excess demand for electricity to power air conditioning, made necessary by the heat wave and global warming, Governor Cuomo had overseen the closure of Indian Point nuclear power station in April 2021, ahead of schedule.
Nuclear power produces zero carbon emissions, whereas Indian Point has been replaced with three natural gas-fired powerstations which, while still generating 50% of the carbon of coal-fired stations are not carbon-neutral. New York aspires to 100% carbon-free electricity 2040 in line with its 2019 Clean Energy Standard.
As heat advisories remain in place in the city as of now with warnings of temperatures continuing to exceed 100 degrees, residents must be wondering about the likelihood of further blackouts should the heatwave continue.
Power shortages across the US
The experiences of citizens in the US are being shared by those in states across the US.
2021 has been a bad year for Texas in terms of its energy supply. During last winter, Texas was hit with three unseasonably harsh winter storms in 10-days which left some 4.5 million residents without power. Problems have continued into the summer too.
In June, the Energy Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) called for consumer assistance in avoiding power outages, many consumers went along with measures with a heavy heart but a sense of inevitability. The announcement made on June 14th included a worrying indication of the scale of the potential problem:
"...a significant number of unexpected power plant outages, combined with expected record use of electricity due to hot weather, has resulted in tight grid conditions. Approximately 12,000 megawatts of generation were offline Monday, or enough to power 2.4 million homes on a hot summer day"
Coming around the same time as Governor Greg Abbott announced a renewed project to build a wall along the state's border with Mexico that would be funded in part by donations from Texans as well as $1.1 billion of federal funding, many felt the money should be used to sort out the power supply issues instead.
Source: Twitter
Remote control thermostats
It's also emergedthat various Texan energy companies have been using remote management software to adjust the thermostats in the homes of consumers, increasing them by a few degrees to help save energy. KHOU 11 revealed the startling discovery that some customers have unknowingly enrolled their thermostats into an energy-conservation promotion called Smart Savers Texas, run by a company called EnergyHub.
Some of EnergyHub's clients include CenterPoint Energy, ERCOT and TXU Energy and correspondingly their customers may have opted in for the use of the software to be used against their thermostats.
Similar schemes have been offered by other Texas power companies. CPS Energy for example offers a one-time bill credit upon enrollment and annual bill credits at the end of summer to customers that use a qualified WiFi-enabled thermostat and allow it to be adjusted remotely.
There's a clear need for controlling measures to prevent energy shortages and blackouts amidst a heatwave, many end-consumers are aggrieved that external power companies can seemingly take matters into their own hands.
What next?
Power shortages aren't just an issue for New York and Texas. An article in The Spokesman estimates that Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, Washington and Oregon could all face power shortfalls. It blames the issue on climate change having brought about the high temperatures, in combination with the pressure upon energy companies to move to renewable sources of electricity - both are placing a burden on supply.
New Yorkers will be hoping that the blackouts of July 1st were a one-off event, but as the heatwave continues it seems likely that further shortages will occur if supply cannot meet demand. Time will tell.
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