Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.comSign up Sept 6 (Reuters) – California’s grid operator forecast record power demand on Tuesday and urged consumers to save energy for a seventh straight day to avoid blackouts amid rising temperatures. California’s Independent System Operator (ISO) has urged residents to reduce electricity use in the late afternoon and early evening as the sun sets and the state’s vast supply of electricity generated by the state recedes. California’s weekly streak of record temperatures is forecast to continue this week with highs reaching 110 degrees Fahrenheit (mid 40 degrees Celsius) in interior parts of the state, according to the National Weather Service. Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.comSign up ISO forecast demand will peak at 51,590 megawatts (MW) on Tuesday, surpassing the current record of 50,270 MW set in 2006, before falling to 49,868 MW on Wednesday. As of late Tuesday morning, solar power was supplying about a third of the state’s electricity demand. “We need a reduction in energy use that is two or three times greater than we have seen so far as this historic heat wave continues to intensify,” Elliot Mainzer, ISO’s CEO, said in a statement. If demand for power depletes the grid’s electricity reserves, the ISO said it would instruct utilities to begin rolling outages. It would be the first time the state has taken such a measure since a brutal heat wave in August 2020 forced power outages for two days in about 800,000 homes and businesses. US electricity prices in California and other western states on Tuesday soared to the highest level since that 2020 heat wave. Electricity prices at the Palo Verde hub in Arizona and SP-15 in Southern California rose to $850 and $505 per megawatt hour, respectively. That was the highest since record highs of $1,311 in Palo Verde and $698 in SP-15 in August 2020, when the ISO last imposed rotation breaks. Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.comSign up Reporting by Scott DiSavino in New York and Nichola Groom in Los Angeles. Edited by Sandra Maler Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
