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| Tuesday Dec 2, 2025 | |
| Colder temperatures moving into the South Central U.S. since the final week of November through the first week of December have elevated power demand, particularly during early-morning light-load hours and the morning/evening ramp periods. Growing electrification, through mini-split units, electric furnaces, and supplemental electric heating, continues to shift winter load patterns away from traditional thermal units. With renewables gaining a larger footprint across ERCOT, SPP, and MISO-South, system operators rely more heavily on net load (demand minus wind and solar) to understand grid dynamics and anticipate volatility. As temperatures fall sharply across the Plains and major Texas metros, the regional hourly load shape is expected to transition into a “double-hump” ... » read more | |
| Monday Dec 1, 2025 | |
| As we delve deeper in winter, we see nature slowing down. The yellows and reds on the trees have turned to brown and the flocks of birds migrating overhead are growing sparse. We see a similar slowdown in the renewable space, as the short days tighten solar output. This brings us close to the end of an exciting season, defined by capacity growth across the country. Here, we focus on California. The figure below shows cumulative renewable curtailments as reported by CAISO, where the line shows the sum of annual curtailments by date, with years differentiated by color. Figure 1 | CAISO Cumulative Renewable Curtailments (MWh) This year, curtailments started earlier while the recent trend has leveled out given Mother Nature decided to deliver cloudy skies for most of November. Starting ... » read more | |
| Wednesday Nov 26, 2025 | |
| This week is quite chilly in Alberta with below-normal temperatures through Sunday. The figure below comes from Atmospheric G2’s aggregate AESO temperature forecast, along with Calgary temperatures, with blue representing temperatures lower than seasonal normals while red is above normal. Overnight lows this week are expected to drop below 12 degrees F and as low as 4 degrees F this weekend. Highs are expected to stay below freezing. The province flips quickly to above normal at the start of December; overnight lows move up to 20 degrees while highs approach 40 degrees F. It’ll be a brief reprieve, however, as more below normal temperatures sit at the end of the 15-day forecast. Figure 1 | Atmospheric G2 AESO Temperature Forecast Unlike the cold weather in the US later this ... » read more | |
| Tuesday Nov 25, 2025 | |
| At EGPS, we keep our audience fully informed—not only through our Morning Reports, Monthly and Quarterly publications, but also through our Weekly Market Reports, which arrive in your inbox every weekend. These updates provide a clear snapshot of how the market evolved over the past several days and highlight what to watch as the new week takes shape. In last week’s report, we highlighted the market’s sensitivity to shifting weather expectations—an influence that continues to shape market sentiment as we head into the Thanksgiving holiday stretch. Over the weekend, the focus remained on the upcoming coldest weather pattern of the season for the Lower 48. Despite the anticipated drop in temperatures, front-month pricing eased slightly, as traders continue to ... » read more | |
| Monday Nov 24, 2025 | |
| In winter, nothing is more important to natural gas demand than cold weather and resulting heating demand. Utilities do not report on this form of demand directly. Instead, it gets lumped in with residential/commercial demand, aka ResCom. This bucket covers all molecules sent directly to residences and businesses and excludes demand from power plants. Gas demand from cooking, etc. does not see a major change across the season, so increases in ResCom equate to an increase in heating demand. Figure 1 | PGAE ResCom Demand Our first figure shows ResCom demand in PGAE, northern California’s biggest utility. In red, we see the current year, compared to 2024 (yellow) and 2023 (blue). Here, we see a very consistent pattern. In the warmest months of the year, this form of demand drops to a ... » read more | |
| Friday Nov 21, 2025 | |
| Written by Tim Belden The 16th Annual Portland Aluminum Man Competition (“AMC”) took place on a beautiful, sunny day in September in Portland, Oregon. The event is called “Aluminum Man” (think aluminum foil) because it is the opposite of an intense event such as Iron Man. The AMC consists of twelve men competing in a series of ten individual and team events. The first event starts at 8am and the final event ends around 11 pm. Teams are re-assigned after each event with the goal of ensuring that each participant is on a team with every other participant at least once during the day. In the end, we don’t crown a winner; instead, we crown a loser who becomes the Aluminum Man. After the ninth event, we tally the scores for each person. The guys in 11th and 12th ... » read more | |
| Thursday Nov 20, 2025 | |
| While overall hydro generation in the Pacific Northwest has been mostly stable so far this month—thanks in part to the ongoing chum spawning operation, that supports Lower Columbia flows to maintain the river level above 11.3 feet on the Bonneville tailwater from early November through close to the end of December, using stored water from behind Grand Coulee to augment flows if necessary—that is not to say that the Northwest has seen no changes in hydro-relevant conditions. After a fairly wet start to November, things have dried up significantly in recent days. While this is not having much of an impact on current flows or generation, it could have implications for later in the water year. Figure 1 | NWRFC ESP10 Jan-Jul Water Supply Forecast for The ... » read more | |
| Wednesday Nov 19, 2025 | |
| Last week marked the first taste of the upcoming winter season as temperatures across the middle of the country dropped. Snow fell across the Midwest while parts of Texas dipped near freezing temperatures. The figure below shows average aggregate temperatures for the Midwest, as well as differences from seasonal normals. After a slow start to autumn with summer-like temperatures for much of the first half of October, the second half of last month and the first week of November were closer to seasonal normals. Then the region fast forwarded to winter. On November 9th and 10th average Midwest temperatures fell more than 20 degrees below normal, dropping under freezing. With more frigid weather on the horizon, we’re looking back at how the Midwest handled this first winter test. Figure ... » read more | |
| Tuesday Nov 18, 2025 | |
| Mother Nature has been firmly in control across the SPP footprint this month, delivering a streak of well-above-normal temperatures that continues to dominate the 9–10 day outlook. The board shows widespread daytime highs in the 50s and 60s, with even typically colder northern cities such as Bismarck, Fargo, and Sioux Falls holding in the 40s–50s through much of next week—significant warmth for late November. Across the central and southern corridor, places like Wichita, Oklahoma City, Tulsa, and Amarillo consistently sit in the mid-50s to mid-60s, with overnight lows rarely approaching levels that would normally drive early-winter heating demand. This prolonged warm anomaly has kept systemwide load suppressed and has shaped the balancing dynamics throughout November ... » read more | |
| Monday Nov 17, 2025 | |
| Baseload resources describe the portion of the power generation stack that optimally produces a steady flow of MWs across all hours of the day. The most cut and dry example would be nuclear resources. Apart from a few weeks every year (refueling maintenance), these plants will run at full capacity regardless of intraday shifts in supply and demand. Thermal and hydro are not considered baseload as they have the ability to ramp their production depending on what is going on in the market. With the growth of solar generation, price signals increasingly push resources to “flex” their output, with the aim of dropping non-solar generation in the midday and pushing it up after the sun sets. Batteries have been introducted over the past few years as another resource that ... » read more | |