ERCOT's own intraday projection of demand against the capacity expected to be available — the gap between the two is the reserve the grid is actually operating on right now.
How much headroom does the ERCOT grid have?
ERCOT forecast demand peaks at 82,483 MW on Thu, 5 PM, against a low of 55,145 MW — a swing of 27,338 MW across the window. Forecast demand is the heaviest area at 82,483 MW.
Explore the forecast in place
Plotted window Sep 24, 8:05 AM CDT → Sep 26, 12:00 AM CDT. Refreshed continuously; the latest published outlook is shown. Source snapshot Sep 25, 7:55 AM CDT.
Every line above, and who produced it.
Observed or settled values for the plotted intervals. Source: ERCOT.
A published forecast for the plotted target intervals. Source: ERCOT.
A published forecast for the plotted target intervals. Source: ERCOT.
Each day of the window on its own.
Every hour of the window, shaded by load.
| 0 | 6 | 12 | 18 | |||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thu, 9/24 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Fri, 9/25 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sat, 9/26 |
Darkest cells are the tightest hours. The window peaks at 82,483 MW on Thu, 5 PM, local to the market.
| Series | Peak (MW) | Peak hour | Low (MW) | Average (MW) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Forecast demand | 82,483 | Thu, 5 PM | 55,145 | 69,408 |
| Forecast available capacity | 108,828 | Fri, 5 PM | 79,936 | 94,534 |
| Planned outage capacity | 13,718 | Fri, 10 AM | 8,281 | 10,330 |
| Forecast | Avg miss (MW) | Avg miss % | Bias | Hours |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ERCOT intraday demand | 1,159 | 1.8% | −106 | 287 |
The latest published vintage of each forecast, against what settled. Smaller is better on every column. Bias is signed: positive means the forecast ran high.
| Series | Produced by | Method | Horizon | Issued |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Forecast demand | ERCOT | Supply and demand dashboard feed (forward forecast series) | ERCOT's intraday forward outlook — hours ahead, not days | Issue time not exposed by this feed |
| Forecast available capacity | ERCOT | Supply and demand dashboard feed (forward forecast series) | ERCOT's intraday forward outlook — hours ahead, not days | Issue time not exposed by this feed |
Both curves are ERCOT point projections with no confidence band. Available capacity moves quickly as units trip, return, or are committed — it is an expectation, not a commitment.
Two curves from ERCOT's supply-and-demand feed: projected demand, and the generating capacity expected to be available to serve it. The distance between them is the operating reserve — the buffer the grid has left. The chart carries the last day as well as the day ahead, with settled demand under the forecast that was published for those same hours, so you can see how the outlook has been performing before reading what it says next. This is ERCOT's intraday outlook, so it looks hours ahead rather than days; for the week-ahead demand picture, see the load forecast.
A comfortable grid shows a wide, steady gap between capacity and demand. Tight conditions look like the two curves converging, usually in the late-afternoon and early-evening hours when demand peaks and solar falls away. It is the narrowing of that gap, not the absolute level of demand, that drives ERCOT's conservation appeals and emergency notices.
As reserves fall, ERCOT moves through defined operating conditions — advisories, watches, and then Energy Emergency Alert levels. Prices respond well before that: ERCOT's scarcity pricing mechanism raises prices sharply as reserves tighten, which is the market's signal for more generation to come online.
curl "https://askthegrid.com/api/v1/grid/radar/curves?iso=ERCOT&horizon=extended"
Connect your agent to mcp.askthegrid.com and this forecast is a tool call away — the same host Claude and ChatGPT connectors already use.
The honest answer is in the gap between the two curves above, for the hours ERCOT has published. When forecast available capacity sits comfortably above forecast demand across the peak hours, the grid has room. When they converge, reserves are tight and ERCOT may issue conservation appeals. This page shows ERCOT's own intraday numbers rather than a prediction of its operational decisions.
The amount of generating capacity available above what is needed to meet demand, usually expressed in megawatts or as a percentage. It is the buffer that absorbs a unit tripping offline, demand coming in above forecast, or wind and solar underdelivering.
A defined set of escalating operating states ERCOT enters when operating reserves fall below specific thresholds. Each level unlocks additional tools — deploying reserves, calling on demand response, and at the most severe level, controlled load shedding to protect the grid.
Because reducing demand during the tightest hours directly widens the reserve margin. Conservation appeals are typically issued when the forecast shows demand approaching available capacity during the evening peak, and they are a normal operating tool, not in themselves a sign that outages are imminent.
No. Tight reserves are a normal and frequent condition in ERCOT, especially on hot summer evenings, and they are usually resolved by generation responding to high prices and by demand response. Controlled outages are the last step in a long escalation and are rare.