AUDUBON, Pennsylvania — The grid operator managing electricity for more than 67 million customers across 13 states and the District of Columbia declared an energy emergency Sunday and asked the federal government for emergency powers to prevent potential blackouts beginning today.
PJM Interconnection filed a letter Saturday to U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright requesting an emergency order under Section 202(c) of the Federal Power Act. The request takes effect today, Monday, May 18, and would remain in place through Wednesday, May 20.
The crisis stems from an unseasonably hot mid-May heat wave pushing temperatures into the nineties across much of the eastern United States, arriving at the same time that 40,400 MW of generation capacity is offline for scheduled maintenance. PJM projects a demand of approximately 135,000 MW during Monday’s and Tuesday’s evening peaks — a demand that the grid cannot safely meet with available reserves.
PJM projects have less than 5,800 MW of reserves during Monday’s peak. The grid operator has recalled every available generator and transmission outage it can and has already issued several alerts.
The emergency order PJM is seeking would allow utility companies to disconnect data centers from grid power and automatically transfer them to their own backup generation facilities — and to do so, in PJM’s own words, notwithstanding any applicable environmental limitations under federal, state, or local law or regulation.
The measure is a last resort. PJM’s letter states the authority would only be used after all other available reliability tools have been deployed and before any firm load interruption — meaning before homes and businesses lose power.
The BGE, PEPCO, and Dominion zones covering Maryland, Virginia, and the Washington DC area are identified as areas of particular concern due to transmission constraints limiting power imports into those regions.
PJM requested the order take effect by noon today.