How do power plants “know” the exact amount of energy that is in demand at a current moment by the millions of consumers within its distribution network since they must produce near this amount of energy (either too much or too little energy being pumped into the grid in comparison to the energy demand has negative consequences, if I understand correctly?)
Is there some sort of signaling system that can tell how much power is being drawn at a exact moment or will be drawn one second/minute into the future?
What happens if too much energy is produced at a current moment compared to the demand?
In: 12
They don’t know the exact amount.
The unpredictable sources (wind solar ect) produce their amount,
Nuclear and coal (which can ramp up/down but take hours or more) produce their bit
Gas plants then make up idealy just enough to fill the final gap
I’m practise to avoid brown outs they make some percent safety over this, and the extra is discarded/lost
Power management involves tuning each of these sources up and down to waste as little energy as possible, and use as much wind/nuc as possible to help the environment
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