Imports and exports of power

Imports and exports of power is a work in progress where a new multi-state marketplace – the Energy Imbalance Market (EIM) was created. It allows quicker trading of electricity with other grids. Five regional utilities joined EIM and provided $330 million in economic benefits for customers of participating utilities to date as of Q1 2018. In addition, it uses 66 gigawatt-hours of electricity from wind and solar that would have been curtailed during the first quarter. It’s also decreased the need for ramping of in-state resources. There are restrictions to the benefits EIM offers. It operates in the real-time dispatch and fifteen-minute markets so it’s limited on addressing the difference between day-ahead forecasts and actual load. Even with EIM, California displays a net volume of imported electricity during hours of peak solar generation, while it curtails solar and wind. The maximum function of California’s import-export balance is held back by rigid bilateral contracts between the state’s  investor owned utilities; Pacific Gas & Electric Company, Southern California Edison, San Diego Gas & Electric Companies, and out-of-state generators. 
 

Market’s rigid rules 

The biggest problem that California is facing is its ability to make its electricity system more flexible for renewable energy. The immediate problem lies with market rules. If California’s big  utilities block the ability to integrate more renewables by signing inflexible contracts, it’s because their allowed to. Market rules prevent out-of-state hydro resource from offering flexibility. The resolution to this is by mandating these resources to bid into the day-ahead market so it could give them time to adjust. Another problem is transmission access and costs. Electricity from renewable energy resources in other states may have to cross grid boundaries to get to CAISO or other markets.Transmission access is limited by resources with a mandate to run.
 

Creation of a regional grid operator in the Western United States

Advocates say that there is a solution to EIM restrictions of transmission access, pancaked transmission charges,and bilateral contracts. The answer would be to  develop a regional grid operator role in the Western United States. This would monitor and oversee the  supply and demand in a wholesale market. This has been endorsed by NRDC and the CAISO. 
 

Give flexibility a chance through energy storage deployment 

Flexibility concerns could also be solved with deployment of large volumes of energy storage. California already deploys on a mass scale and estimates 140 MW of storage, but does need  thousands of megawatts to be an efficient replacement.  Also, there’s a mass rollout of electric vehicles to discuss grid needs. If the proper market signals gave EV charging networks, it’ll incentivized to operate during the day. This uses  solar generation and lessening ramping needs.

Solar power is here to stay, and the sooner you explore how much you can save, the sooner you can enjoy the benefits of residential solar power. Go to HahaSmart.com and try our price checker tool. It tells you how much solar power you need, and how much you can save. Please visit our solar blog to find out more about the benefits of going solar.