Eclipse Failure: How Energy Traders Misread the Market Badly
- So many Americans were outside that electricity demand fell
- ‘The people who tended to be short tended to make money’
Watch the Total Solar Eclipse in 60 Seconds
Grid operators and traders thought they were totally prepped for the historic U.S. solar eclipse. There was just this one thing they didn’t completely factor in: “irregular human-behavior patterns.”
That’s the technical definition, from the folks who manage the electricity network at the Southwest Power Pool, for the conduct of millions of Americans who were outdoors ogling the moon shadowing the sun instead of cranking up the A/C in homes and offices. Demand, of course, tends to rise heading into the hottest part of a summer day. On Monday, it developed a weird U-shaped dip over a two-hour period across the country.