Coal news and updates

 

Coal and natural gas power plants were more likely to fail during the cold snap that hit Texas on Jan. 6, according to the  latest report from the Electric Reliability Council of Texas.

ERCOT issued an  alert level 2 just after 7:15 a.m. that morning, when many Texans were returning to school and work from the winter holiday.

At the peak in the 7 a.m. hour, 9,355 MW of power generation that ERCOT was counting on was unavailable.

Frozen instrumentation and failed equipment were the biggest culprits, contributing to 65 percent of the megawatts lost during the Jan. 6 event, ERCOT reported.

Natural gas plants, both gas-steam boilers and combined cycle, combined for 66 percent of the megawatts unavailable during the outage. Coal made up 18.8 percent of the failed megawatts, including Dallas-based Luminant’s Big Brown and the Oak Grove plants. Those plants combined produce more than 1,700 MW of power.

On the other hand, wind energy proved much more reliable, with only about 5.7 percent going offline.

Reserves dipped below 1,750 MW. All this happened while Texans were being urged to conserve electricity to prevent rolling blackouts. That means thermostats at 68 degrees or lower.

The Sierra Club was quick to pounce on this new data saying this proves that renewable energy is more reliable during extreme weather events.

“This new report from ERCOT shows that clean energy solutions, especially clean, cheap Texas wind and demand response performed as expected under pressure, whereas numerous coal-fired and gas-fired power plants across the state couldn’t handle the January cold snap,” Al Armendariz, senior campaign representative with Seirra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign. “ERCOT indicates in their report that they are investigating the reliability problems with the plants, and we hope the generators are held accountable for their failures.”

 

 

Source: http://www.bizjournals.com/