“PJM Grid Sees Biggest Demand EVER, NatGas & Coal Saved the Day”, By Jim Willis

“Yesterday, with the bitter cold blast (called a polar vortex) hitting the eastern half of the country, the PJM power grid, which covers all or parts of 13 states plus the District of Columbia…”

PJM Grid Sees Biggest Demand EVER, NatGas & Coal Saved the Day

ELECTRICAL GENERATION | INDUSTRYWIDE ISSUES

January 23, 2025

Yesterday, with the bitter cold blast (called a polar vortex) hitting the eastern half of the country, the PJM power grid, which covers all or parts of 13 states plus the District of Columbia (including all of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia), experienced its largest single-day power draw EVER. The grid came through with flying colors thanks to natural gas, which provided an average of 42.5% of the total power produced yesterday, and coal, which produced 22.9% of all the power produced yesterday. Add in oil with another 3%, and fossil fuels carried the heavy load by producing 68.4% of PJM’s electricity yesterday. How much did solar and wind produce? An infinitesimally small 4.46% of the electricity produced yesterday. Nuclear produced nearly a quarter of PJM’s electricity yesterday at 24.5%.

According to an update issued by PJM (below), the grid not only hit a brand new all-time high of 145,000 megawatts (MW) of demand but also exported 8,000 MW to other grids to help them out. Behold the power of natural gas!

From PJM:

The PJM generation fleet and transmission system performed reliably through record electricity demand Wednesday morning while supporting neighboring systems on all fronts.

PJM reached a preliminary record for winter demand at around 8:15 a.m. with instantaneous peak load coming in at approximately 145,000 MW, while exporting nearly 8,000 MW to our neighbors. This exceeds PJM’s all-time winter instantaneous peak of approximately 143,700 MW, set in February 2015, pending the availability of verified metered load data.

PJM’s Mike Bryson, Sr. Vice President – Operations, said PJM and its member companies took a number of steps before the onset of the frigid cold that helped prepare the system for the most difficult periods Tuesday and Wednesday. These included:

• Cold Weather Advisory and Cold Weather Alert: Helps members get engaged with preparing for the cold weather

• Conservative Operations declaration: Helps generators line up gas purchases with the gas market, especially over holiday weekends

• Maintenance Outage Recall: Maximizes generator availability by requiring generators that were out for maintenance to come back in service

• Low Voltage Alert: Maximizes transmission system capability

• Maximum Generation Alert: Issued Tuesday to alert neighboring regions that electricity exports from PJM may be curtailed, if necessary

“We also worked closely with member companies to help resolve any cold-weather issues before the deep freeze set in,” Bryson said. “All of those steps served to help PJM and our members get ready for the cold weather. They have performed remarkably thus far, and I am grateful for their efforts.”

Bryson noted that significant demand – close to 140,000 MW – is forecasted for Wednesday evening and Thursday morning, so Operations continues to monitor performance of the generation fleet and transmission systems.

PJM was exporting close to 8,000 MW of electricity to neighbors at the peak demand Wednesday morning and as much as 9,000 MW at other points in the so-called “arctic outbreak.” Bryson noted that interchange with neighbors can go both ways, and PJM has depended on its neighbors in the past.

PJM’s preliminary loads are calculated from raw telemetry data and are approximate figures. Verified metered loads are provided by electric distribution companies and represent the best-quality level of load within their zones, with adjustments to data occurring up to 90 days after the actual date. (1)

We fished the raw data from the PJM website for Jan. 22. PJM reports hour by hour how much of its electricity is produced by various sources. We averaged each source and got the following overall averages for the entire day:

Here’s the same data in a pretty pie chart:

As you can see, without fossil energy, the lights would go out in PJM.

The following article from the Pittsburgh Business Times not only mentions PJM and the new record demand but also how several local utility companies in the Pittsburgh market held up during the brutal cold snap:

Wednesday morning saw a record winter demand for electricity across the multistate regional electrical grid that includes Pennsylvania, but utilities serving western Pennsylvania said they’ve seen no power interruptions or widespread issues.

The minus 9 degree low temperature recorded Wednesday in Pittsburgh was the coldest it has been since February 2015, according to the National Weather Service. There’s also been a trace of snowfall every day for 21 days, and colder-than-normal temperatures throughout the past three weeks here and other parts of the Northeast and Midwest.

PJM Interconnection said it set a record for winter demand with 145,000 megawatts of electricity at 8:15 a.m. Wednesday, which surpassed the 143,000 megawatts of electricity demand during that February 2015 cold snap. The regional grid, which includes Pennsylvania and West Virginia and is the largest in the country, had warned Tuesday night that it might have to curtail electrical exports outside of the PJM grid and had also worked with utilities and power producers to maximize its generation to prepare.

“All of those steps served to help PJM and our members get ready for the cold weather,” said Mike Bryson, SVP of operations at PJM. “They have performed remarkably thus far, and I am grateful for their efforts.”

No problems were reported locally.

“We have not experienced any impacts due to the frigid temperatures, nor have we seen a significant number of power outages,” said Duquesne Light spokeswoman Ashley Macik. “The system is performing well. We are continuing to monitor the situation and are prepared to safely address any issues as quickly as possible.”

West Penn Power has had only a few localized outages and it’s not clear whether they are related to the cold weather or not, West Penn spokesman Todd Meyers said.

“Our priority is to get our customers back on as quickly as safety permits in the frigid weather,” he said.

Meyers said the system has been performing well.

“It’s no accident that FirstEnergy’s electric distribution system across the state – including the West Penn Power footprint – has stood up and operated well so far through several days of frigid arctic chill,” he said. “We completed rigorous inspections of overhead lines and substations in the fall to identify components that needed to be repaired or replaced in advance of the winter season when our customers depend on electricity to keep safe and warm.”

PJM expects that the high demand will continue, albeit at a lesser pace, through Wednesday night and into Thursday. PJM exported about 8,000 megawatts of electricity outside the regional grid to help other regions. (2)

(1) PJM Inside Lines (Jan 22, 2025) – Jan. 22 Update: Extreme Cold Produces PJM Record for Winter Electricity Demand

(2) Pittsburgh (PA) Business Times/Paul Gough (Jan 22, 2025) – Utilities standing up well to record demand during Arctic cold snap