Back to News
POWER Magazineabout 1 month ago

Five Winters After Uri: Why Winter Readiness Must Go Beyond Weatherization

Key Takeaway

Despite five years of regulatory and operational improvements, the grid remains highly vulnerable to extreme cold, necessitating continued investment and innovation beyond basic weatherization to ensure reliability for developers and large loads.

AI Summary

  • The North American power sector has implemented significant regulatory and operational changes (EOP-012-3, Order 587-AB) post-Uri to enhance winter readiness.
  • Key initiatives include mandatory cold weather critical component inventories and dual-fuel conversion projects for generation assets.
  • Despite these efforts, recent events like Winter Storm Fern demonstrate the grid still operates 'very close to the edge' during extreme cold, indicating persistent reliability risks for large power consumers and potential for market volatility.

Topics

capacity-marketccgtfercpolicysimple-cycletransmission

Article Content

From EOP-012-3 to Order 587-AB, from Cold Weather Critical Component inventories to dual-fuel conversions, the bulk power system has spent five years rewiring how it prepares for extreme cold. Winter Storm Fern, the latest test, showed the system ran “very close to the edge.” The last five winters have given the North American power sector […] The post Five Winters After Uri: Why Winter Readiness Must Go Beyond Weatherization appeared first on POWER Magazine .