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| Thursday Jun 18, 2026 | |
| The Columbia River hydro system hit a seasonal inflection point of the spill year this week. As we flagged in last week's PNW Hydro Flash, Tuesday the 16th marked the transition from 2026 spring spill operations to summer spill rules at the four Lower Columbia (LC) projects — McNary, John Day, The Dalles, and Bonneville — with the Lower Snake dams set to follow this Sunday, the 21st. The switch does the opposite of what we saw back in April at the start of the spring spill period: rather than pulling water off the turbines for juvenile fish passage, a portion of the water being spilled gets handed back to generation. The result showed up right away in the numbers. Figure 1 | Lower Columbia Hourly Generation Flows and Spill (kcfs) by Project Figure 1 plots actual hourly ... » read more | |
| Wednesday Jun 17, 2026 | |
| Energy GPS is pleased to announce the new AESO Net Load Summary dashboard. As Alberta's grid continues to integrate growing volumes of wind and solar capacity, tracking how renewable output shapes the net load obligation on thermal and dispatchable resources has become increasingly important for market participants. This new daily dashboard provides a concise, at-a-glance view of AESO load, net load, and renewables, combining current-day actuals with day-ahead forecasts and historical context to help subscribers quickly assess how the grid is evolving from one day to the next. Table 1 | AESO Net Load Actuals and Forecast (MW) The dashboard opens with a detailed summary table presenting hourly-block averages for load, net load, and renewables across key time windows: the light-load ... » read more | |
| Tuesday Jun 16, 2026 | |
| Early June offered another reminder that in ERCOT, strong demand forecasts do not always translate into record-breaking system peaks as discussed in our latest article titled “ERCOT Summer Peak Watch”. Despite widespread heat and expectations that June 10 and 11 could produce some of the highest demand intervals of the month, actual peak load ultimately came in below forecast. The outcome highlights a market that is becoming increasingly shaped not only by weather, but also by customer behavior and economic incentives. Figure 1 | ERCOT Daily Load One of the biggest drivers behind this trend is the growing influence of the 4CP season. As forecast demand begins approaching the upper-70 GW range, many large customers have a financial incentive to reduce electricity consumption ... » read more | |
| Monday Jun 15, 2026 | |
| An assumption people make about the Pacific Northwest power grid is it mainly runs on water. For most of 2026, this has been true given where the snowpack was dumped but the past several days is a useful reminder that the region’s natural gas fleet is needed. Molecules flowing on GTN and Northwest Pipeline (NWP) are sitting at the margin, and the margin is exactly where all the interesting action happens. When a heat event lands, when hydro is locked in and when wind picks the wrong moment to disappear, it is the gas fleet that absorbs the difference. The trigger: heat, load, and a price that broke away The story starts with temperature. A heat ridge pushed readings into the 90s across the region over the weekend, and forecasts had much of Oregon stepping even higher into Monday. » read more | |
| Friday Jun 12, 2026 | |
| Much of our writing and analysis at EGPS relates to price of key energy commodities such as electricity and natural gas. We expect that prices for energy and power will vary from region based on the unique supply and demand features and refer to the difference in price from place to place as “basis”. And the ability to purchase something in one place or at a place or time and either transport or store it for sale at a different location or time at a higher price as “arbitrage”. An underlying assumption of all this is that the commodity in question is fungible, in that a MWh of electricity or MMBtu of natural gas has no distinction from another - other than its location and availability at any one time. As a corollary to power markets, in recent years we have ... » read more | |
| Thursday Jun 11, 2026 | |
| This spring has provided fertile ground CAISO batteries to operate, starting with the rollout of the ISO’s Extended Day-Ahead Market (EDAM) where its first added participant was PacifiCorp. Along with the EDAM, CAISO rolled out its Day-Ahead Market Enhancement (DAME) upgrade that was designed to provide more market price discovery in the integrated market regulation up and down markets and which was is a benefit to all flexible resources given the transparency it provides for all ancillary service and flexible capacity payments intertwined within the marketplace. Against this backdrop, batteries have also been operating in an environment characterized by significant solar growth in southern California and the Desert Southwest prompting midday curtailments and negative pricing, which ... » read more | |
| Wednesday Jun 10, 2026 | |
| Summer arrived a few weeks early in the Midwest. A heat wave is moving across the middle of the country this week, bringing above-normal temperatures to MISO. The figure below shows the average Midwest temperature forecasts from the end of May to yesterday’s forecast on the far right which shows temperatures through June 23rd. Red and orange represent above normal temperatures while blue shows below normal temperatures with the darkest colors on the days expecting more extreme temperatures. The heat this week has been percolating since last month. By the beginning of June, the heat was expected to last for over a week and a half with the hottest days expecting average temperatures over 76 degrees F. In more recent forecasts, the end of the heat tapered off, but temperatures for this ... » read more | |
| Tuesday Jun 9, 2026 | |
| SPP fundamentals are tightening as temperatures trend higher across the region, pushing peak load steadily upward through the second week of June. Forecast peak demand climbs from the low-40 GW range earlier this June to nearly 50 GW on June 9-10, with system load expected to reach 49.6 GW and 49.8 GW, respectively. Under normal circumstances, a demand increase of that magnitude would raise concerns about higher thermal generation requirements and stronger power prices. However, Mother Nature appears to be providing a timely offset, as wind generation is forecast to strengthen alongside the load increase rather than move against it. Wind output rises from roughly 11-16 GW during the first week of June to more than 24-26 GW during the June 9-11 period, with forecast peaks reaching 24.7 GW ... » read more | |
| Monday Jun 8, 2026 | |
| The grid operations differ across the country as market fundamentals point to current weather patterns and what makes up the supply stack. For several regions, Mother Nature is bringing some heat over the next week while the renewable landscape continues to impact the marginal megawatt as solar and wind swings are present heading into the second week of June 2026. Figure 1 | ERCOT Net Load Profile – Actual and Forecast Below is a summary of what has unfolded over the weekend across the country pertaining to natural gas and power markets. Weather The national weather picture is defined by a brief transition window. After the warmth that characterized the opening of June, a moderating trend pulls back the forecast starting around Day 5, holding through Day 12 — only for similar ... » read more | |
| Friday Jun 5, 2026 | |
| The late spring/early summer season in Texas can be a period of volatility when it comes to the weather. Often, the rainiest times of the year can occur in May or June. Rainfall has been occurring over various parts of the region yesterday and today, and more rain is in the forecast for the coming few days: Figure 1 | Weather Forecast for Texas Cities The rain and associated cloudy weather can have a meaningful impact on ERCOT's generation stack. Over the past few years, peak midday solar output has doubled or tripled (depending on which month you look at), and it's easy to find hours where solar is the largest single component of the supply stack. Figure 2 | ERCOT Average Hourly Supply Stack, 2026 YTD The figure above shows ERCOT's average supply stack, by hour, for 2026 so far. » read more | |