Also, although the trend across years is real, the duck curve shown in the graph is a bit exaggerated because they graph the lowest net load day from each spring. Maybe I’ve got this wrong, but I think they’re showing the worst-case duck curve day for each year.
It’d be interesting to see a graph of how the duck looks on average or in a few specific load cases.
That is a good thing and expected.
The duck curve is referenced to 0. The load curve for CAISO today swings between about 19GW and 27GW – [https://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/default.aspx](https://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/default.aspx). CAISO is a proxy for California as whole but it is by far the largest.
The Western grid is the closest to the dream of the super grid with over 7GW North-South transmission. There is also good transmission North to the mountain states.
The Northwest uses that transmission to cover California’s solar ramp with hydro. The North is glad to import California’s excess solar mid-day at the right price. If you go to [http://www.energyonline.com/Data/GenericData.aspx?DataId=20](http://www.energyonline.com/Data/GenericData.aspx?DataId=20) and adjust the time scale, you can see the price some days is under $.02 per kWh + transmission cost for peak solar hours. Yesterday, a holiday, the price in some CAISO zones went below 0 from about 11AM-3PM
As the article says, the more buildout of solar with storage the better. Sadly recently the California PUC has severely limited that. We still have a lot of buildout of solar (and storage) across AZ, NM, & TX.
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FYI – This is a reprint of an article from June.
[https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=61103](https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=61103)
Also, although the trend across years is real, the duck curve shown in the graph is a bit exaggerated because they graph the lowest net load day from each spring. Maybe I’ve got this wrong, but I think they’re showing the worst-case duck curve day for each year.
It’d be interesting to see a graph of how the duck looks on average or in a few specific load cases.
That is a good thing and expected.
The duck curve is referenced to 0. The load curve for CAISO today swings between about 19GW and 27GW – [https://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/default.aspx](https://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/default.aspx). CAISO is a proxy for California as whole but it is by far the largest.
The Western grid is the closest to the dream of the super grid with over 7GW North-South transmission. There is also good transmission North to the mountain states.
The Northwest uses that transmission to cover California’s solar ramp with hydro. The North is glad to import California’s excess solar mid-day at the right price. If you go to [http://www.energyonline.com/Data/GenericData.aspx?DataId=20](http://www.energyonline.com/Data/GenericData.aspx?DataId=20) and adjust the time scale, you can see the price some days is under $.02 per kWh + transmission cost for peak solar hours. Yesterday, a holiday, the price in some CAISO zones went below 0 from about 11AM-3PM
As the article says, the more buildout of solar with storage the better. Sadly recently the California PUC has severely limited that. We still have a lot of buildout of solar (and storage) across AZ, NM, & TX.
The power capacity of energy storage planned for California is coming along: [https://www.energy.ca.gov/data-reports/energy-almanac/california-electricity-data/california-energy-storage-system-survey](https://www.energy.ca.gov/data-reports/energy-almanac/california-electricity-data/california-energy-storage-system-survey)
This is my first time seeing and hearing about the duck curve. Can someone explain it to me like I’m 5?