How is the US power grid going to handle the solar eclipse?
This is its first major test since the country started bringing in large amounts of renewable energy onto the system
San Francisco/New York — In a few hours, the first total eclipse of its kind in 99 years will plunge broad swaths of the US into darkness, sending solar supplies sliding and testing the resilience of the power grid for the first time since the rapid rise of renewable energy. Grid operators, utilities and electricity generators are bracing for more than 12,000MW of solar power to start falling offline as the moon blocks out the sun across a 113km corridor stretching from Oregon to South Carolina. This is the first major test of the power grid since America started bringing large amounts of intermittent solar and wind resources onto the system. It comes just as the grid is undergoing an unprecedented transformation whereby flexible resources such as battery storage will complement growing supplies of solar and wind. Solar installations have grown nine-fold since 2012 and renewable sources are forecast to supply just as much of America’s electricity demand as natural gas by 2040. The U...
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