Texas summer power crunch punches up 2,153 megawatts

TEXAS – New power generators coming online will add capacity to the state’s power grid. Six new units, totaling 2,153 megawatts (MW) of capacity, are slated to come on by August. Of that, 2,112 MW is coming from four new facilities:

•  Deer Park Energy Center is in Harris County
•  Ferguson Replacement is northwest of Austin
•  Panda Sherman is north of Dallas
•  Panda Temple is near Temple

A report by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), the state’s grid operator, has forecasted peak electricity demand this summer to be 68,000 megawatts, just shy of an all-time record set in August 2011.

One megawatt is the equivalent to the amount of electricity needed to serve about 200 homes during peak conditions in the late afternoon on a hot summer day.