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AES Announces Construction Complete on 1,000-MW, Solar-Plus-Storage Project in California

LCG, June 11, 2025--The AES Corporation (AES) announced today that it has completed construction of the 1,000 MW Bellefield 1 project, which is under a 15-year contract with Amazon. Bellefield is a two-phase project, with each phase including 500 MW of solar plus 500 MW of a four-hour, battery energy storage system (BESS). When Phase II is completed in 2026, the total installed capacity will be 2,000 MW, and AES expects the total project will be the largest solar-plus-storage facility in the United States.

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Duke Energy Proposes to Build 1,400-MW Natural Gas-Fired Power Plant in South Carolina

LCG, June 9, 2025--Duke Energy announced today its intent to submit an application to the Public Service Commission of South Carolina (PSCSC) for approval to build a new natural gas combined-cycle generating facility with hydrogen capability in Anderson County, South Carolina. The company plans to submit the construction application to the PSCSC later this year. If approved, it expects construction would commence in summer 2027, with operations beginning by early 2031.

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Industry News

ERCOT Releases SARA Reports for Spring and Summer

LCG, March 2, 2017--ERCOT yesterday released its final Seasonal Assessment of Resource Adequacy (SARA) for spring (March-May) and a preliminary outlook for summer (June-September). ERCOT anticipates there will be sufficient generation to meet projected peak demand during the upcoming spring and summer seasons.

ERCOT's Senior Director of System Planning stated, "In preparing our seasonal forecasts, we studied multiple scenarios to test the ERCOT system. Under the most extreme scenarios considered, there were adequate generation reserves to maintain reliability."

The new report identifies more than 82,000 MW of generation resources available to serve the expected spring peak demand of approximately 58,000 MW, which is based on average spring weather conditions from 2002 through 2015. This year's spring peak is most likely to occur in late May, following the completion of most seasonal power plant maintenance outages that occur in preparation for summer demand.

ERCOT's Senior Meteorologist said, "We are expecting warmer-than-normal temperatures to continue in the ERCOT region this spring. The rain forecast will be normal to above-normal for most of Texas, and drought is not expected to be a concern for the vast majority of the ERCOT region through the spring season."

The preliminary summer SARA report shows a peak load forecast of nearly 73,000 MW based on normal summer weather conditions during ERCOT's peak demand periods. The summer peak is 2.6 percent higher than ERCOT's all-time peak demand record of 71,110 MW, which occurred last August.

Installed wind power capacity continues to grow and impact ERCOT's generation mix. According to the American Wind Energy Associate (AWEA), in 2016 Texas continued to lead the nation in wind power capacity additions, with 2,611 MW of new capacity. At the end of 2016, the total installed wind power in Texas totaled 20,321 MW, plus 5,401 MW of wind power capacity under construction.

With wind playing a larger role in ERCOT's generation resource mix, the SARA summer report reflects a scenario that combines the forecast peak load with extremely low wind output that represents only 3.8 percent of the total installed wind capacity. In contrast, the historical average contribution is 19.4 percent of installed capacity during summer peak load hours.

The final summer SARA report will be released in early May 2017.
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