PROJECT
06
Load and Generation Hosting Capacities
For ENMAX Power Corporation, planning the electricity system includes anticipating the effect of new connections to the grid. ENMAX Power’s planning teams need to understand the existing constraints and upcoming demands on the system (loads) to ensure continued reliable electricity service to customers. With the rise of distributed energy resources (DER), the planning teams also need to know where customers can potentially generate electricity, while maintaining the quality and reliability of the grid.
address to quickly understand the system’s available capacity to accommodate the electrical needs of their project. The map is fed data from forecasting and system assessment tools developed in-house.
Commercial customers need to understand existing system constraints when choosing a location for their projects, especially those with large loads such as data centers.
The maps are also used internally to give ENMAX Power visibility into load and DER adoption impacts on the system, and to gain insight into future system improvement.
The second map shows hosting capacity, or the capability for DER projects to be connected to the grid. A customer can search locations to assess the system’s capacity to accommodate their proposed power generation.
In fall 2019, the team launched two interactive online maps, available on enmax.com, which display area load and hosting capacities. Both maps allow customers to quickly shortlist potential locations for their next project. The load capacity map illustrates the estimated load capacity available within the ENMAX Power distribution service territory. A customer can search for an CoE 2020: Electricity Innovation • Canadian Electricity association 15
