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BOSTON, MA – On Wednesday, July 27, with temperatures
and humidity levels soaring across the Northeast, electric demand
in both New York and New England threatened to outstrip supply and
cause a blackout. Due to the severity of the situation, both regional
grid operators, the New York Independent System Operator (NYISO) and
the Independent System Operator of New England (ISO-NE), activated
their emergency demand response programs.
EnerNOC, the leading provider of full-service demand response
solutions, acted immediately to reduce load at approximately 250
commercial and industrial customer sites throughout the two regions.
EnerNOC took approximately 130 MW's, or the equivalent of 130,000
households' worth of demand, off-line, thereby allowing the available
supply to meet demand and the grid to remain operational throughout
both regions.
David Brewster, EnerNOC's President and COO, commented, "We feel
very good about the role we played in maintaining grid reliability on
Wednesday. These events further demonstrated that technology-enabled
demand response is a reliable, cost-effective solution to the challenges
of the electricity industry. EnerNOC's technology platform provided us
with the capability to quickly and remotely control assets in two
regions during two separate, but concurrent events."
On Tuesday, July 26, with the support of the company's automated demand
response notification and control system, EnerNOC issued an advisory to
its customers in New York and New England that there was a high probability
that a demand response event would occur. This possibility arose from the
unusually tight day-ahead demand forecasts and high energy price projections.
By late morning on Wednesday, July 27, EnerNOC observed that electricity
prices in both Southwest Connecticut and New York were increasing rapidly and
electric demand was exceeding forecasts, signifying the difficulty grid
operators were having supplying adequate electricity to the regions.
Due to the risk of grid failure, at 12:49 p.m. NYISO activated EnerNOC's
demand response resources starting at 2:00 p.m. ISO-NE was not far behind,
and at 12:53 p.m. requested EnerNOC to activate its resources beginning at
1:00 p.m. EnerNOC met these calls by curtailing load and/or starting
back-up generators accordingly at its metered and controlled customer
sites throughout both regions.
NYISO declared an end to the emergency at 6:00 p.m. and EnerNOC restored
its customer loads in New York to normal operation. Peak demand during the
day reached 30,903 MW, slightly lower than the all-time peak demand set on
Tuesday, July 26 at 32,075 MW.
In New England, the grid operator requested an extension of load reduction
beyond the normal event conclusion time of 6:00 p.m. due to the severity of
the situation in Southwest Connecticut. Many of EnerNOC's assets willingly
complied with this request, and ISO-NE finally declared the end of the event
for 7:15 p.m. Peak demand in ISO-NE reached 26,922 MW during the day – a new
record for the region.
In a press release issued by ISO-NE, Senior Vice President and Chief
Operating Officer Stephen G. Whitley commented on the state of the grid on July
27th, "Today's heat and humidity pushed electricity use to new levels
in New England, affecting Southwest Connecticut in particular, where
inadequacies in the electricity system make short-term emergency measures necessary.
Fortunately, ISO New England was able to call upon its emergency resources in
Southwest Connecticut today to maintain power system reliability in that area."
About EnerNOC:
EnerNOC, Inc. is the leading provider of demand response,
price response, and demand side management solutions to the
commercial and industrial markets in the United States. EnerNOC
delivers immediate, profitable results to customers by leveraging
its deep experience in all aspects of energy management, commercial
contracting, and embedded systems technology. For more information
visit www.enernoc.com.
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