PJM on Thursday reviewed the extensive actions taken by the grid operator and its members to successfully maintain reliability through the record-breaking, extended cold temperatures that swept through the region through the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday period.
Record-Breaking Winter Cold
The so-called “Arctic Outbreak” was notable for sustained periods of cold flowing west to east for air and wind chill temperatures below zero, especially in the western states in the PJM region. The frigid conditions that set in on Jan. 18 reached a crescendo Jan. 22 with a new PJM record for hourly winter electricity demand (also known as load) of approximately 143,714 MW between 8 and 9 a.m., according to preliminary data.
In addition to reliably meeting that record load, PJM also continued exporting around 8,000 MW to neighboring grids that morning while maintaining its reserve margin. The six-day event ending Jan. 23 also produced PJM’s fifth-highest (139,208 MW on Jan. 21) and sixth-highest (138,799 MW on Jan. 23) winter loads, preliminary data show.
“PJM successfully dispatched reserves sufficient to serve record winter peak load, an accomplishment driven by good load forecasting, effective communications, and strong generator and transmission performance,” Kevin Hatch, Sr. Manager – Dispatch, told stakeholders during his presentation (PDF) at the Feb. 6 meeting of the Operating Committee.
Risk-Based Approach Yields Success
Prior to the advancing cold front, PJM implemented a steady cadence of communications, coordination with members, unit preparation, operations and market analysis, and other actions. Many of these practices were informed by the lessons learned from recent extreme weather events, including Winter Storm Elliott in 2022.
Event successes included:
- Load forecasts proved reliable.
- Sufficient reserves were procured to serve multiple record winter peak loads while maintaining exports to assist neighboring regions.
- Solid generation performance was assisted by generator-supplied updates to Markets Gateway for improved operator situational awareness.
- Exercising of generators’ ability to start and operate before the event reduced outages and improved performance when units were needed.
- Transmission maintenance or work outages were successfully recalled or rescheduled to improve transfer capability.
- Effective PJM Emergency Procedures remained limited to advisories and alerts.
Longstanding Concerns on Display
The extended cold spell also raised longstanding concerns over market rules reflecting operator actions for reliability.
Pre-event analysis by PJM suggested that around 40,000 MW of generation supplies could be at risk from cold weather, start-up or operational performance issues, based on operating parameters provided by generation owners.
Under Conservative Operations, PJM scheduled – roughly – between 58,000 MW to 68,000 MW of generation well in advance of each operating day to make sure that power would be available when it was needed during the extreme weather.
These commitments were required in part by the mismatch between actual dispatch needs and gas industry purchasing practices, particularly those requiring generators to purchase gas for multiple-day blocks over long holiday weekends.
Under the Conservative Operations protocol, PJM committed units ahead of time to be online from Sunday, Jan. 19, through Thursday, Jan. 23. Uplift payments compensated many of these units for the costs of the energy provided that was not covered by the standard market price when they followed instructions from PJM dispatchers.
PJM and stakeholders are discussing many of these market rules in the stakeholder process, particularly in the Electric Gas Coordination Subcommittee and the Reserve Certainty Senior Task Force, including market design changes to manage forecasted uncertainty, resource ramping needs and other factors driven by the evolving grid.