Grid Power Support - When Supply Can’t Meet Demand

With lights and appliances mostly turned off at nighttime, demand is usually at its lowest. Whereas a blast of kettles and coffee makers firing up in the morning requires a larger surge than most might expect.

Seasonal changes are also unsurprisingly influential. Heating units are used far more heavily in winter months, while summer heatwaves see households across the country turn to their AC systems for relief.

Clearly, such dramatic fluctuations in demand make grid operation a tricky business. Operators need to ensure that enough electricity is available at any one moment, whether or not seasonal or time factors are influencing customers’ behaviors and power needs.

Surging demand and affected supply

But as the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) is finding, this isn’t always possible, particularly when usage is surging to unprecedented levels. That can leave grids suffering from major outages, brownouts, and even blackouts that can plunge whole towns into darkness without warning.

Seasonal events can play a significant factor in creating these issues, drawing in large crowds to towns that lack the infrastructure to support such a high level of demand. Extreme weather also has a role to play, with a winter storm causing blackouts for up to 3 million Texans in February, and soaring temperatures creating similar problems today. In ERCOT’s case, this has even led to a plea for residents to limit their electrical usage.

In these instances, Aggreko can help. For example, for a world-famous sailboat race in South Carolina, we were called in to help secure the grid against the extra load. This was expected to push the local substation well past the limits of the 22kV line. With the event taking place at the end of the line, any additional disturbances would also threaten to leave an entire section of the island completely in the dark.

We brought in a diesel-powered plant along with custom controls to monitor the increased demand on-site, from the substation itself. This plant automatically produced the extra power needed and was able to immediately detect any loss of power on the main grid. If required, the plant could switch into isochronous loud share mode to prevent any interruptions to our customers’ power supply. In just three weeks, we installed and tested the temporary system, allowing the event to run without a single hitch.

Usage increase isn’t the only event that can mean a grid struggles to meet demand. Equipment failure and the subsequent impact can quickly affect the supply of power to customers. That can suddenly lead to a situation that is out-of-control.

What can grid operators do?

It’s no surprise that the key aim of any grid should be to provide enough power to keep the lights on and appliances working for every connected customer. But these moments of increased usage, equipment failure, extreme weather, and other unforeseen events can create a challenge for even the most prepared grid operator.

To help out, Aggreko has a wide selection of easy-to-implement, efficient systems that our reliable and responsive teams can set up quickly, to get your grid up and running as soon as possible.

Our engineered systems can either be deployed on a proactive or a reactive basis, helping to increase your grid capacity and alleviate any congestion you might be experiencing. Wherever and whenever the available electricity supply is outstripped by the demand, we can step in and plug the gap with our array of support options.

For example, one utility in the Northeast was wary of how they would deal with demand before much-needed infrastructure upgrades were able to take place. Located in a very popular summer vacation spot, they wanted to mitigate the risk of equipment failure, brownouts, and rolling blackouts.

To help out, we designed and installed a plant specifically to match their needs. Burning diesel was simply not an option, so we set up two separate substation sites that together were capable of producing up to 18MW of power. That additional capacity ensured that they could cope with increased demand as and when it occurred, without fear of problems cutting their supply.

Final thoughts

Each and every year power grids face surges in demand that test their limits. Whether a particularly hot wave of weather sees people turn their AC units up to the maximum, a one-off large event is taking place that threatens to overload the local electricity supply, or sudden equipment failure significantly reduces that supply at the source. But by implementing infrastructure support prior to any of those outages, grid operators can finally have the peace of mind that none of their customers will suddenly be left without power.

To do that, you need to choose a temporary utility vendor with the experience to predict or respond to your specific needs. Who can provide you with fast, easy, and affordable equipment on the ground, before any of your customers notice any effect on their power supply.

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