Megan Hall: Welcome to Possibly, where we take on huge problems like the future of our planet, and break them down into small questions with unexpected answers. I’m Megan Hall.
With the effects of climate change all around us, there’s a push to power more of our lives with renewable electricity, including things that used to burn fossil fuels, like home heating and cars.
But can our electricity grid handle a big ramp-up in demand?
To help us think about this, I reached out to our founder, Stephen Porder, who’s also the Provost of Sustainability at Brown University. Welcome, Stephen.
Stephen Porder: Megan, good to be here. Good to hear from you.
Megan Hall: Let’s start with the basics. I get that power plants make electricity that is then delivered to our homes. But how do they make sure the make the amount they make matches what we need? Is there storage in the grid?
Stephen Porder: Yeah, so it’s an interesting question. And it’s kind of amazing, because the answer is no, it has to provide exactly the amount of power that everyone needs, it can’t provide more, and it can’t provide less.
Megan Hall: How does the grid know how much electricity to make?
Stephen Porder: Basically, it’s a series of different markets, for markets that link the people who are producing power the power plants through a utility that’s distributing that power to the consumer.
Megan Hall: Okay, so walk me through the markets, what’s market number one?
Stephen Porder: So market number one is really like thinking about planning. So you’re building a new community or you know, there’s going to be an increased demand until you might build a new power plant. So that’s sort of in the background. But on a daily basis, or a monthly basis, you have what you have.
Megan Hall: So what’s the market two? Talk about that.
Stephen Porder: market today is called the day ahead, market, the day ahead market uses forecasts of how much electricity demand, there’ll be the next day, the utility goes out and asks power plant providers, can you provide me and at what price? Can you provide me enough electricity to meet tomorrow’s demand?
Megan Hall: But are they always right? I mean, you can’t predict like exactly how the weather is going to be, what do they do about that?
Stephen Porder: That’s why there’s the third and fourth market. So the third market is a 15 Minute Market, there’s a projection, okay, in 15 minutes, we’re going to need this much power. And so they’ll call up and say, Hey, we’re gonna need a little extra power, because it’s hotter than we thought, can you provide it?
Megan Hall: And then what’s the fourth market? That’s like, on the split second?
Stephen Porder: Yeah, it’s an automated market and it monitors the frequency of electricity in the grid. And if it rises or dips out of a zone of safety, then power is either produced or curtailed, based on those sub second changes in demand.
Megan Hall: Wow. So is there someone just like sitting at a desk on the phone all day saying, like, give us more power? Give us less power?
Stephen Porder: Yeah, you know, that’s the vision I have, I think I think more of it is automated than we think. But you know, honestly, I don’t know the answer. I’m really curious who that person is.
Megan Hall: This seems like a really precarious situation. Like, how is it that most of the time when I need electricity, like when I turn on a switch, the electricity is always there when I need it?
Stephen Porder: So it’s kind of amazing, right? That it works at all, and it’s connected to everything. So it really is it’s the biggest, most complicated machine in the world ever, ever devised by by human ingenuity.
Megan Hall: If everyone today in let’s say, Rhode Island decided, today’s the day I’m going to pull the trigger, I’m going to get an electric car. Could the electricity grid handle all those people plugging their cars in to charge them?
Stephen Porder: That’s a whole other Possibly.
Megan Hall: Okay, I guess we’ll have to answer that question next week.
That’s it for today. For more information or ask a question about the way your choices affect our planet. Go to the public’s radio.org/possibly or subscribe to us wherever you get your podcasts. You can also follow us on Facebook and Twitter at AskPossibly.
Possibly is a co-production of the Institute of Brown for Environment and Society, Brown’s Climate Solutions Initiative, and The Public’s Radio.
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