People in Northwestern Alberta did the right thing Saturday night, unplugging enough that the provincial power grid was able to avoid resorting to a series of rotating power outages.
The Alberta Electric System Operator (AESO) worked with the province to issue an emergency alert, asking everyone to reduce electricity use to essential needs only.
Almost immediately, the AESO says there was a 100 megawatt (MW) drop in demand, which soared to a 200 MW reduction within minutes.
Nathan Neudorf, Alberta’s minister of affordability and utilities, said the event was triggered by a number of factors, “including very low wind production.”
Neudorf adds that “We have a lot of work to do to make our system more efficient and optimize the generation that we have.”
– Kyle Moore, Trending 55 Newsroom
