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14 May 2008 -- The outlook for electricity reliability for the coming summer season is generally good according to the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) in its annual 2008 Summer Reliability Assessment.
NERC officials noted reliability concerns in Southern California and the drought-stricken Southeast U.S. Also of note were increasing demand and limited infrastructure improvements. However, officials were encouraged that several reliability issues highlighted in last summer's assessment have been addressed.
Specific findings, as detailed in the report, include:
Capacity Margins Adequate–Net capacity margins for the U.S. increased by 1.9 percent over last summer's assessment, while net capacity margins in Canada show a slight decrease of 1 percent. All regions project to operate within their target margin levels. However, Southern California remains an area of concern, where voluntary conservation and on-call interruptible loads are projected to be needed more frequently than normal. The Southeast remains an area to watch as well, though drought conditions are improving and are not expected to impact reliability this summer.
Coal Inventories Below Average, Natural Gas Supply is Healthy–Driven by strong global demand, U.S. coal exports have increased significantly over the past six months, putting constraints on the supply available to North American generators, which has, in turn, resulted in a drop in coal inventories at Eastern generators. While these lower inventories do not present an imminent reliability concern, NERC will be monitoring this situation over the coming months. The outlook for U.S. natural gas supply is healthy on all fronts heading into the summer.
Demand Response Reduces Demand, Provides Ancillary Services–Demand response is increasing as a resource to meet electricity demands, with some regions reporting peak demand reductions of more than six percent. In addition, a significant amount of demand response is being used as a resource to increase operational flexibility.
Wind Resources Contribute to Capacity–Wind is becoming an increasingly significant resource in North America as new facilities come into service. New data in the 2008 assessment shows that estimates of capacity available on peak are a critical component of effectively planning for and operating variable resources.
The 2008 Summer Reliability Assessment report is available at: ftp://ftp.nerc.com/pub/sys/all_updl/docs/pubs/summer2008.pdf.
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