Natural gas <p> Let's talk about natural gas and, please, Joe and Tiler, you don't need to jump in and comment. You don't really have to. Just read but no comment, please.</p> <p> So, last I checked nat gas was up 5% today. The gas market is often unpredictable and erratic but I went to check the weather forecast in the U.S. and EIA real time electricity monitor.<br /> <br /> The current temperatures in the populous Houston and Dallas TX are about a nice 85F, moving up to 90 in a few days, then up to 95 and holding, and then closer to 100 in about 8-10 days. </p> <p> The seven days electricity production by source in the ERCOT grid is showing a huge spike in natural gas generation this weekend, peaking at more than 35,000 MW on Saturday and Sunday while the normal range in prior days was roughly between 20-30,000 MW. What happened, is wind production plunged from more than 20,000 MW to a tiny 1,300 MW.
Wind forecasts are not reliable beyond 3-4 days but it's easy to imagine a situation when temperatures stay above 95 for several consecutive days and there is no wind? They will burn gas like crazy.
Florida is the second largest state using natural gas for electricity generation, followed by California. The latter has a huge installed solar capacity which is rapidly falling in the afternoon hours down to zero in the evening. A heat wave, still hot when it's dark and they will burn gas like crazy in green CA.
This is early June only. The hottest months are July and August, and September in the south.