SCED System Lambda

ERCOT's five-minute real-time system lambda, the system-wide marginal energy component of SCED LMP.

Prices data ERCOT market

Query with the agent Open on map

Native record

SCED interval

5-minute (SCED) publication cadence

Evidence

Observed market data

Published observations from the named source

In Ask the Grid

Price nodes on the ERCOT map

Reference for the live grid surface

Overview

For a settlement point or electrical bus in the same SCED interval, LMP minus system lambda is the point's congestion component; ERCOT LMP has no marginal-loss component. This supports point-level congestion rankings and history when joined interval by interval to real-time LMP. It does not identify which binding constraint affected a point without shift-factor or other direct attribution evidence.

Query contract

Preserve one current system-lambda value per event_time before joining it to the matching real-time LMP interval.

Analysis rules

Bucket LMP and system lambda to the same five-minute SCED interval before subtracting.
For point congestion history or rankings, compute congestion = LMP - system_lambda per point and interval before calculating extrema, spread, or other aggregates.

Interpretation

ERCOT LMP has no marginal-loss component; LMP minus system lambda is the congestion component.
A point congestion component does not identify the binding constraint that produced it without matched shift-factor or direct attribution evidence.

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.

ERCOT MCP API reference

HTTP endpoint

POST /api/v1/datasets/ercot_sced_system_lambda/query

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Schema6

Column

Type

event_timeDateTime64(6, 'UTC')

system_lambdaNullable(Float64)

dst_flagNullable(Bool)

emil_idNullable(String)

doc_idNullable(Int64)

ingested_atDateTime64(6, 'UTC')

Sample data

event_time	system_lambda	dst_flag	emil_id	doc_id	ingested_at
2026-10-13 22:10:25.000000	76.49789	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:14:12.230035
2026-10-13 22:05:24.000000	63.6279	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:14:12.230035
2026-10-13 22:05:24.000000	63.6279	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:09:12.603832
2026-10-13 22:00:24.000000	66.83384	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:14:12.230035
2026-10-13 22:00:24.000000	66.83384	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:09:12.603832
2026-10-13 21:55:22.000000	82.67642	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:14:12.230035
2026-10-13 21:55:22.000000	82.67642	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:09:12.603832
2026-10-13 21:55:22.000000	82.67642	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:04:13.504501
2026-10-13 21:55:22.000000	82.67642	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 21:59:11.974627
2026-10-13 21:50:22.000000	88.62586	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:14:12.230035
2026-10-13 21:50:22.000000	88.62586	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:09:12.603832
2026-10-13 21:50:22.000000	88.62586	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:04:13.504501
2026-10-13 21:50:22.000000	88.62586	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 21:59:11.974627
2026-10-13 21:45:25.000000	83.49611	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:14:12.230035
2026-10-13 21:45:25.000000	83.49611	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:09:12.603832
2026-10-13 21:45:25.000000	83.49611	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:04:13.504501
2026-10-13 21:45:25.000000	83.49611	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 21:59:11.974627
2026-10-13 21:40:25.000000	68.28986	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:14:12.230035
2026-10-13 21:40:25.000000	68.28986	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:09:12.603832
2026-10-13 21:40:25.000000	68.28986	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:04:13.504501
2026-10-13 21:40:25.000000	68.28986	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 21:59:11.974627
2026-10-13 21:35:22.000000	84.62779	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:14:12.230035
2026-10-13 21:35:22.000000	84.62779	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:09:12.603832
2026-10-13 21:35:22.000000	84.62779	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 22:04:13.504501
2026-10-13 21:35:22.000000	84.62779	false	∅	∅	2026-10-13 21:59:11.974627

Coverage

100.0% complete0 gap days4,549 days with data

Show coverage history

Coverage: 100.0%Days with data: 4,549Gaps: 0

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Related prices data

Related prices data
Dataset	Description
DAM Settlement Point PricesERCOT · hourly (DAM)	Hourly settlement point prices cleared in the ERCOT Day-Ahead Market, covering every settlement point in Texas (load zones, hubs, and resource nodes). These are the prices at which energy is bought and sold a day in advance of delivery, set the afternoon before each operating day. They are the day-ahead counterpart to real-time locational prices, and the gap between the two reflects how the market expected conditions to differ from how they actually unfolded. Traders use them to position and hedge, generators and loads use them to plan commitments, and researchers use them to study how congestion and scarcity show up across the grid.
DAM System LambdaERCOT · hourly (DAM)	ERCOT's hourly day-ahead system lambda, the system-wide marginal energy component in the cleared Day-Ahead Market. For the same delivery hour and settlement point, day-ahead SPP minus DAM system lambda is the point's cleared day-ahead congestion component. Paired with SCED system lambda and real-time LMP, it supports day-ahead-versus-real-time congestion basis by point. It does not identify a binding constraint's effect on a point without direct attribution evidence.
DAM Total Energy SoldERCOT · hourly (DAM)	This dataset reports the total energy sold in ERCOT's Day-Ahead Market, in megawatt-hours, for each delivery hour. It represents the system-wide quantity of energy that cleared the day-ahead auction, where buyers and sellers commit to next-day positions before real-time operations. The hourly shape across a day shows how much of expected Texas demand is locked in financially a day ahead, and tracking it over time reveals shifts in day-ahead market participation and how forward commitments line up against eventual real-time conditions. The figures come from ERCOT report NP4-193-CD.
ERCOT Day-Ahead PricesERCOT · hourly (DAM)	ERCOT day-ahead locational marginal prices, one row per interval and location. 66.7M rows, 2017-01 to the next delivery day. Carries price_usd_mwh plus energy_usd_mwh and congestion_usd_mwh, with energy taken from ERCOT's DAM system lambda. No loss component: ERCOT does not publish one. Locations are node, zone, hub, interface; location_id joins atg.ercot_locations for the readable name, and kind is carried inline so a hub-only or zone-only question needs no join at all. Every market's day-ahead price table in this catalog has these same column names, so a cross-market price comparison is a UNION rather than a per-ISO rewrite. Revisions are already collapsed — read it plainly.