Ascend Analytics Projects Robust Load Growth Through 2030, But Less Than ERCOT Forecasts

Ascend’s ERCOT Market Forecast Report Highlights Shifting Dynamics in Texas, Including the Growing Relationship Between Wind and Scarcity Conditions that are Increasingly Moving into Sunset Hours and Extending into September.

‍BOULDER, Colorado, September 4, 2024: Ascend Analytics (“Ascend”), the leading provider of market intelligence and analytics solutions for the energy transition, today announced the publication of its new ERCOT Market Forecast, the most recent release in its series of comprehensive analyses of changes in price volatility, curtailment, real-time market dynamics, and ancillary services across key energy markets in the United States and Europe. The market forecast is a core component of Ascend’s Market Intelligence (“AscendMI™”) solution and a foundational input into the company’s platform of complementary operational and valuation products. This updated ERCOT Market Forecast examines the implications for developers, financiers, and utility planners of changing market fundamentals in the unique and rapidly expanding Texas power market.

These include:

• Unprecedented load growth – Ascend projects more than 105 GW of peak demand in 2030, less than the 150 GW in ERCOT’s revised forecast, but still representing substantial load growth from 85 GW today. Heightened load growth could exceed near-term buildout levels.
• Shifting scarcity season, September’s growing importance – As solar buildout continues, September’s shorter days, but increasingly elevated temperatures and decreased wind output are raising the risk of critical scarcity conditions, commensurate price volatility and substantial price spikes. The month will be an increasingly important contributor to both revenue potential and risk.
• Transitioning energy mix – Ascend forecasts ERCOT to add ~26 GW of renewables by the end of 2030, with wind and solar dominating the energy mix by 2031. Incoming renewables and storage will put economic retirement pressure on thermal generation, requiring ERCOT to have special incentives to avoid recurring scarcity conditions.
• Shifting price shapes - Continued solar deployment will cause price shapes to become increasingly ‘duck-shaped’ throughout the 2020s, with lower sunup prices, especially in the spring and fall shoulder seasons.
• Geographic disparity - ERCOT’s transmission constraints and heterogeneous distribution of generation types will drive persistent electricity price differences between the state’s east and west, in the Houston area, and at the Southern Peninsula.

"As Texas’s energy transition accelerates, ERCOT’s energy-only market is subtly adapting, not least of all by creating capacity revenues in a variety of forms for dispatchable generating resources,” said Brent Nelson, Managing Director of Markets and Strategy at Ascend Analytics. “This is one of numerous new market dynamics for storage developers and investors to navigate in ERCOT – dynamics that will continue to drive near-term volatility and its associated revenue risks and opportunities.”

The ERCOT Market Forecast is a bi-annual publication, developed utilizing Ascend’s proprietary Opportunity Cost Forecast Framework, which is designed to capture all the key driving forces for supply, demand, and price in an era of energy transition.

About Ascend Analytics

Ascend Analytics is the leading provider of market intelligence and analytics solutions for the energy transition. The company’s offerings enable decision makers in power supply, procurement, and investment markets to plan, operate, monetize, and manage risk for renewable energy and storage assets. From real-time to 30-year horizons, their forecasts and insights are at the foundation of over $50 billion in project financing assessments. Ascend provides energy market stakeholders with the clarity and confidence to successfully navigate the rapidly shifting energy landscape.  

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Ascend Analytics is the leading provider of market intelligence and analytics solutions for the energy transition. The company’s offerings enable decision makers in power development and supply procurement to maximize the value of planning, operating, and managing risk for renewable, storage, and other assets. From real-time to 30-year horizons, their forecasts and insights are at the foundation of over $50 billion in project financing assessments. Ascend provides energy market stakeholders with the clarity and confidence to successfully navigate the rapidly shifting energy landscape.