PJM manages the grid in the NY-PA-NJ and some of the other areas, but not entirely sure. Managing the grid means that they tell power plants to turn on (or off) as needed. If we are using 800MW, they make sure 800MW is being fed into the grid.
The guy who installed my solar system also has a very large company that is the interface between PJM and large power users. That means that if your power plant uses 5WM of power an hour, PJM may turn off your grid power and you start using your generator. A prison is a pretty good example. A local prison has a load of 5MW. However, they also have a generator should the power go out, I guess cause they don't want the prisoners to escape. So when the grid is using all the power we are capable of producing, PJM shuts off the prison, and the prison turns on their generator. It's an agreement everyone enters into at will. The prison gets paid a pretty hefty fee (I think $50k/year) for them to be on standby, plus all fuel costs consumed for turning on the generator.
Today is supposed to be one of those days. More power is foretasted to be used than we have power plants capable of producing - i.e. supply exceeds demand. It only happens for 3 reasons: really, really hot, really, really cold, or too many power plants are shut down. So PJM is busy turning people off.
This is really important to the solar industry. Today we have one of those days (it's too hot). But that also means that although I see blue sky outside my window, panel production is down 30% because it's TOO hot. So while the power is useful, it's not as useful as it could be. Production is down 30% and Pennsylvania now has 71MW installed. So instead of producing 71MW of power it's probably more like 50MW when we really need it the most. That's a 20 MW gas turbine that has to be built and sit in a room until days like today. So if we want to talk about the cost of solar power we need to add this to the cost.
The guy who installed my solar system also has a very large company that is the interface between PJM and large power users. That means that if your power plant uses 5WM of power an hour, PJM may turn off your grid power and you start using your generator. A prison is a pretty good example. A local prison has a load of 5MW. However, they also have a generator should the power go out, I guess cause they don't want the prisoners to escape. So when the grid is using all the power we are capable of producing, PJM shuts off the prison, and the prison turns on their generator. It's an agreement everyone enters into at will. The prison gets paid a pretty hefty fee (I think $50k/year) for them to be on standby, plus all fuel costs consumed for turning on the generator.
Today is supposed to be one of those days. More power is foretasted to be used than we have power plants capable of producing - i.e. supply exceeds demand. It only happens for 3 reasons: really, really hot, really, really cold, or too many power plants are shut down. So PJM is busy turning people off.
This is really important to the solar industry. Today we have one of those days (it's too hot). But that also means that although I see blue sky outside my window, panel production is down 30% because it's TOO hot. So while the power is useful, it's not as useful as it could be. Production is down 30% and Pennsylvania now has 71MW installed. So instead of producing 71MW of power it's probably more like 50MW when we really need it the most. That's a 20 MW gas turbine that has to be built and sit in a room until days like today. So if we want to talk about the cost of solar power we need to add this to the cost.
