NL Hydro says through careful management, it was able to ensure that demand never got within the critical 70 MW of capacity this bitterly cold weekend – even with one of the province’s largest generating facilities temporarily offline.
Although enough power was available, the request to conserve power was an effort to ensure that demand didn’t exceed generation.
Frazil ice at Bay d’Espoir (NL Hydro)
A Power Warning was issued on the weekend, when frazil ice clogged the intakes at the Bay d’Espoir power generating station effectively shutting the plant down.
Bay d’Espoir is the island’s largest power generating facility, and having it out of the mix was of utmost concern as power demand rose in frigid temperatures.
As of this morning all watches and warnings had been lifted after Bay d’Espoir returned to service.
NL Hydro’s Rob Collett says this weekend’s warning to conserve power was made to ensure that rolling outages were not necessary.
Collett says Hydro had “sufficient reserves throughout,” the question was a matter of timing.
“It was a bit of a beat the clock situation” says Collett. “With the imports we only had a few hours’ notice.” He says they needed to “stay 70 MW above our load to ensure viable operation, and so we never came below that 70 MW limit…if we go too close, we’ll have frequency issues and those kinds of things.”
