CAISO Price Locations

Every CAISO location that carries a price, as three columns: location_id, name, and kind.

Infrastructure data CAISO market

Query with the agent

Native record

one row per priced location and kind

slow-moving dimension, refreshed every 6 hours publication cadence

Evidence

Reference data

Stable context used to interpret other datasets

Time basis

Point-in-time records

UTC · static reference

Overview

26,632 rows — node (26,048), interface (578), zone (6). This is the dimension the CAISO price, and where applicable constraint, tables join to, and it is the one place a location's type is decided: resolve "which hubs exist", "is this a zone or a node", or "give me the readable name for this id" here rather than inferring a type from a name prefix. For CAISO, name equals location_id (the pnode name). The same three columns exist for every market, so the equivalent question in another ISO is the same query against that ISO's table.

Query contract

Treat (location_id, kind) as the row identity. This is a current dimension snapshot, not a history: it describes the locations that exist now and carries no validity dates.

Analysis rules

Counting rows by kind describes the market's current location inventory. It does not describe how many locations were priced on some past date.
Join fact tables on location_id, and add kind to the join when the fact table also carries kind — the pair, not the id alone, is the identity.

Interpretation

A location existing here does not mean it has a price in any particular interval; check the price table for that.
kind is a classification of the priced object, not of the physical equipment behind it, and carries no capacity, voltage, or geography. Location geography lives in grid.entities.

Access

Query from your own tools

Use the guarded HTTP endpoint directly, or connect an MCP client and load the dataset contract with describe_data before calling query_data.

CAISO MCP API reference

HTTP endpoint

POST /api/v1/datasets/caiso_locations/query

Need the full history of this dataset in Snowflake, Databricks or your own storage? Data services delivers it on a schedule.

Schema3

Column

Type

location_idLowCardinality(String)

nameLowCardinality(String)

kindLowCardinality(String)

Sample data

location_id	name	kind
0096WD_7_N001	0096WD_7_N001	node
0096WD_7_N002	0096WD_7_N002	node
106THSO_LNODED1	106THSO_LNODED1	node
10TH_STW_1_1LNODE	10TH_STW_1_1LNODE	node
10TH_STW_1_2LNODE	10TH_STW_1_2LNODE	node
118THSO_LNODER1	118THSO_LNODER1	node
119TH_BP_LNODEXF1	119TH_BP_LNODEXF1	node
126THSO_LNODE_LDT1	126THSO_LNODE_LDT1	node
126THSO_LNODE_LDT2	126THSO_LNODE_LDT2	node
12STREET_LNODEEET1	12STREET_LNODEEET1	node
12STREET_LNODEEET2	12STREET_LNODEEET2	node
12TH_S_LNODENMZ	12TH_S_LNODENMZ	node
12TH_S_LNODEXWQ	12TH_S_LNODEXWQ	node
13THSO_LNODE-3	13THSO_LNODE-3	node
13THSO_LNODED2	13THSO_LNODED2	node
1501WDC2_7_ND001	1501WDC2_7_ND001	node
22ND_ST_LNODEC22	22ND_ST_LNODEC22	node
22ND_ST_LNODEC23	22ND_ST_LNODEC23	node
22ND_ST_LNODEC32	22ND_ST_LNODEC32	node
22ND_ST_LNODEC33	22ND_ST_LNODEC33	node
22ND_ST_LNODEDIST	22ND_ST_LNODEDIST	node
22ND_ST_LNODEDONED	22ND_ST_LNODEDONED	node
22ND_ST_LNODEIST2	22ND_ST_LNODEIST2	node
22ND_ST_LNODEIST3	22ND_ST_LNODEIST3	node
23RDST_LNODED3	23RDST_LNODED3	node

Coverage

No time-indexed data — coverage isn’t applicable to this dataset.

Related infrastructure data

Related infrastructure data
Dataset	Description
CAISO Interconnection QueueCAISO · monthly snapshot	CAISO's public generation interconnection queue, combining active, completed, and withdrawn projects with the proposed point of interconnection, technology, requested capacity, status, and completion dates. Each posting is a snapshot: current totals must use one latest snapshot, and requested queue MW is not operating capacity, available transmission headroom, or evidence that a project will be built.
Generating Capability ListCAISO · monthly snapshot	Every resource in the CAISO control area with its name, owner, technology, capacity, PTO area and COD, snapshotted monthly from the Master Control Area Generating Capability List. The OASIS `ATL_GEN_CAP_LST` report (version 4), one row per (monthly snapshot, resource_id). It is the registry that says what a resource IS: `caiso.resources` gives only the node a resource settles at, and this gives its name, owner, technology and capacity. `grid.plant_nodes` binds CAISO resources to EIA-860 plants through it. `gen_unit_name` is CAISO's name for the unit ("Bateria Del Sur" for `WESCAN_2_BDSBT1`), often not EIA's name for the plant. An aggregated resource lists its members as their own rows with `parent_resource_id` set, and the parent carries the aggregate's capacity, so summing every row counts an aggregate twice. `energy_source` is CAISO's fuel code: SUN, WIND, LESR (storage), HYBD (hybrid), WATER, URANIUM and so on. `pto_area` is the transmission owner's area (SDGE, SCE, PGAE, VEA); `baa_id` includes resources pseudo-tied or dynamically scheduled in from IID, LADWP and others. History starts 2023-07-01; OASIS returns no data for earlier months.
PNode Reference MapCAISO · reference (periodic snapshot)	CAISO pricing-node (PNode) reference map: pricing-node id, aggregate-node id, name, voltage, node type, and the effective-date window each definition is valid for. This is a dimension / reference table, not a time series — it is a slow-moving registry snapshotted periodically (a handful of vintages), so use it to resolve and label pricing nodes and their attributes rather than for time-based analysis. Join it to the CAISO LMP and shadow-price tables to give nodes human-readable names and group them. The official source is CAISO OASIS.
WEIM Area Price LocationsCAISO · slow-moving dimension, refreshed every 6 hours	The CAISO-priced locations that belong to each WEIM balancing area, keyed by ba: the area's energy load aggregation point (ELAP_<BA>-APND, kind 'aggregate', the area's own price) plus the interfaces and nodes CAISO names with the <BA>_ prefix. 622 locations across 25 areas. Join atg.weim_prices_rt on location_id.