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Reliability Assessment: A Wide-Area Perspective on the August 21, 2017 Total Solar Eclipse

Reliability Assessment: A Wide-Area Perspective on the August 21, 2017 Total Solar Eclipse

Full Title: Reliability Assessment: A Wide-Area Perspective on the August 21, 2017 Total Solar Eclipse
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Publication Date: July 1, 2017
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Description (excerpt):

NASA has predicted that the path of a total solar eclipse will directly affect North American bulk power system (BPS) operations on August 21, 2017. 1, 2 The United States power generation resource mix has become more diverse. The diversity in generation is driven in part by national and state renewable portfolio standards as well as increased environmental regulations. Total solar capacity (distribution and transmission connected) in the United States has increased from 5 MW in 2000 to 42,619 MW in 2016. A total solar eclipse occurred across Continental Europe, Nordic Countries, and Great Britain in 2015. This solar eclipse showed, “… a great deviation in the amount of solar generation that was available before, during, and post eclipse which caused the need for far more advanced coordination of primary, secondary, and tertiary reserves across Europe within a reduced time frame (faster than 10–15 minute intervals).” 3 This deviation in available solar generation indicates a need to study the potential effects that a solar eclipse would have on the North American BPS.

This Wide-Area Perspective on the August 21, 2017 Total Solar Eclipse document was created in order to evaluate potential reliability consequences of the total solar eclipse on the BPS. This assessment focuses specifically on impacts of system loading and potential reliability implications when an area experiences a large reduction of distributed energy resource (DER) capacity due to a total solar eclipse. Ramping is a specific concern for areas with large amounts of variable generation in their resource mix. The areas that have ramping issues will need further evaluation by the Regions and include areas that are not in the direct path of the eclipse. An example of such an area is California, where the transmission (utility) installed nameplate capacity for solar generation is 11,444 MW. Some areas in Northern California are projected to experience up to 95 percent of the obscuration of the Sun from the August 21, 2017 eclipse.

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