Record-setting heat wave pushes California power grid to the brink

Judy Woodruff:

The record-setting heat wave of the past few days has pushed California to the brink, with the state facing its highest chance of rolling blackouts this year.

Stephanie Sy has the latest.

Stephanie Sy:

Another searing day baking California. The state's power grid operator urged residents to conserve energy for an eighth day straight. Demand for electricity last night broke a Golden State record, threatening widespread power losses and rolling blackouts that were narrowly avoided. Residents found shade wherever they could get it.

Yvonne Ochoa, Beach Visitor:

I think a lot of people are using the air conditioner, like, and using light fans, everything just to try to keep cool.

Shaun Clifton, Orange County Resident:

We seem to always just make it through. We have our little tricks to keep cool. Everybody does.

Stephanie Sy:

At the Orange County Zoo, zookeepers gave animals blocks of ice to stay cool.

Person:

Oh, you get that.

Stephanie Sy:

Temperatures surpassed 110 degrees in many parts of the state this week. Sacramento reached a 97-year high at 116.

Earlier this month, California's Death Valley set a new record at 127 degrees. It was the planet's hottest recorded September day. Scientists say climate change has fueled these more intense, longer summers and led to more frequent, raging wildfires. The sprawling Fairview Fire outside Los Angeles broke out this week and is only 5 percent contained.

Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA):

And the risk for outages is real and it's immediate.

Stephanie Sy:

Last night, Governor Gavin Newsom urged people to save power and spoke of a brutal month to come.

Gov. Gavin Newsom:

In fact, this heat wave is on track to be both the hottest and the longest on record for the state and many parts of the West for the month of September.

Stephanie Sy:

Indeed, other parts of the West are under the heat dome, including Salt Lake City, Utah, which recorded its hottest September day since the late 19th century this week and alarmingly low water levels at the Great Salt Lake. Temperatures may not moderate in many places until Friday.

Let's focus on the concern over potential outages in California, the energy grid, and what's being done to deal with the demands of the moment.

For that, I'm joined by Katherine Blunt, who covers renewable energy and utilities at The Wall Street Journal. She's also the author of the new book "California Burning: The Fall of Pacific Gas and Electric and What It Means for America's Power Grid."

Katherine Blunt, thank you so much for joining the "NewsHour."

I was reading that, last night, California's Office of Emergency Services actually sent out an urgent text message telling electricity customers they needed to conserve energy now, or risk outages.

Are those kinds of alerts working to manage demand? And are they enough to prevent the power grid from faltering?

Katherine Blunt, The Wall Street Journal:

Well, I think that's the — that's the million-dollar question.

There was a lot of voluntary conservation last night, which certainly helped keep the situation from going over. It was very close. The grid operator called a certain level of an emergency that was just a hair's width away with having to call for rolling outages.

So it was tight. And that conservation — that conservation helps. But, of course, we are on watch for the rest of the week.

Stephanie Sy:

California seems to have an energy crisis every summer. Why is that, Catherine? Haven't there been improvements made to make the grid more reliable and resilient? There were numerous rolling blackouts that we saw in 2020. Have things improved?

Katherine Blunt:

Yes, so there's been a convergence of a number of different things that have influenced these circumstances.

For one, we are seeing more severe heat waves across the entire region, across California and throughout the West, exacerbated by climate change. And that makes it so that electricity demand during these periods of time is really very high. And this is ultimately a question of keeping levels of demand and supply in balance, because, if there is an imbalance, you risk wider system breakdown.

So that's why, sometimes, there's been the need for rolling blackouts to keep those levels in balance. Of course, California has been consumed by a severe drought. Hydroelectric power generation has been constrained. And during these West-wide heat waves, it becomes harder for California to import power on an emergency basis.

And, of course, there's been a rapid shift to wind and solar power over the last several years, which makes managing supply levels at the time when solar production began to ramp down especially challenging. So that's why you see some of these preventives in the summers.

Stephanie Sy:

Could any of this have been avoided?

I mean, you go through a lot of the complex factors that lead to the strain on energy. All day again, for the eighth day in a row, we have been hearing the grid operator warn of these rolling outages that are extremely disruptive to hundreds of thousands of Californians every year.

Katherine Blunt:

The grid operators have to take increasingly drastic measures to help manage these supply challenges in recent summers.

That's meant relying on more gas-fired power generators. Just recently, the state legislature moved to keep the state's last nuclear power plant online. It had been set to retire in the coming years. And now it looks like it'll run for quite some time longer.

And so it's been — the grid operator had to look for more and more places for additional power.

Stephanie Sy:

California has been very aggressive in embracing renewable, more green energy sources. And yet, every summer, again, we see these energy shortages.

You have reported, Katherine, on how other states are also looking at potential energy crises, as climate change means hotter summers, more people needing more air conditioning.

What can be learned from observing California's transition to renewables and how that can impact energy supply during times of great demand?

Katherine Blunt:

Yes, absolutely.

So, I mean, I think, at its core, this is a timing challenge. It has become challenging to navigate the near-term transition, because, of course, wind and solar power, the production fluctuates, fluctuates with weather and fluctuates with time of day, which makes it a bit more challenging for grid operators to make sure that there's always adequate supplies.

And, in California, you see that most acutely after 4:00 p.m., when solar production begins to decline. This — proponents of the transition, which, of course, is well under way, believe that there's the appropriate technology to be able to deal with this in the future, as we add more battery storage to store wind and solar power for use when production declines.

But one additional challenge that we're seeing here in the near term is that there's been supply chain issues, inflationary pressures and other things that have made it more difficult to bring these projects online in a timely fashion.

So, it looks like the next several years are going to be difficult across a number of different regions that are in the middle of this transition. But there's reason to believe that, longer term, we will be able to sort through some of these many challenges.

Stephanie Sy:

One of your focuses has been the focus on wildfires in California and how that is further straining the energy grid every summer and the role that companies like PG&E play.

How much are those issues playing into the strain on the grid we're seeing this week?

Katherine Blunt:

Sure.

So, when you think about wildfires and how it affects the balance of supply and demand, big fires can constrain transmission capacity, which makes it harder to move power from point A to point B, adding an additional challenge for the grid operator in making sure that there's adequate supply everywhere.

There was a transmission emergency yesterday and the day before up in Northern California, likely associated with some of PG&E's power lines. Details are — aren't exactly clear as to what exactly the problem was, but emergency generation was needed to offset some of the constraints on those lines.

So, I don't think it was fire-related, but it may have been heat-related. So there's all kinds of things that can go wrong in the transport of power that make this more difficult.

Stephanie Sy:

Every year, such a confluence of crises we're seeing there in California.

Katherine Blunt, author of the new book "California Burning" and Wall Street Journal reporter, thank you for joining the "NewsHour."

Katherine Blunt:

Thank you very much for having me. I appreciate it.