Power Trends: New York ISO Podcast

Wind and solar resources are providing more clean, low-cost electricity to the grid than ever before, but the intermittent nature of renewable generation requires careful planning.  In the latest episode of the Power Trends podcast, NYISO Director of Grid Transition Udayan Nair breaks down what the latest data reveals about wind and solar performance, and what it means for reliability in New York...

A surge in natural gas prices this winter was a reminder of the relationship between fuel markets and wholesale electricity prices.  In the latest episode of our Power Trends podcast, U.S. Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) Energy Economist Andrew Iraola and Industry Economist Lindsay Aramayo unpack what drove the recent electricity price spikes, natural gas constraints, and what we can exp...

Electricity prices are rising across New York, and understanding what drives those costs has never been more important. In this Power Trends podcast, NYISO Vice President of Market Structures Shaun Johnson breaks down the factors shaping today’s electricity supply charges and explains how wholesale markets produce the most cost-efficient solutions to meet consumer demand.  Wholesale electricity su...

New York’s electric grid is at an inflection point. In the latest Power Trends podcast, Senior Vice President of System and Resource Planning Zach Smith unpacks two critical reliability reports recently issued by the NYISO: the Comprehensive Reliability Plan (CRP) and the 2025 Third Quarter Short-Term Assessment of Reliability (STAR) . These studies reveal the grid’s mounting challenges—from aging...

In Episode 40 of the Power Trends podcast, NYISO Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Emilie Nelson offers a behind-the-scenes look at how the grid was managed during June’s heatwave, which brought record-setting temperatures across the Northeast. Nelson walks through the critical decisions and emergency measures that helped ensure adequate supply margins across New York.  Accordin...

The electric system is undergoing rapid and instrumental change on a scale not experienced since 1892 when Thomas Edison first electrified the Pearl Street station in lower Manhattan. In the NYISO’s latest podcast, President & CEO Rich Dewey, and Executive Vice President & COO Emilie Nelson discuss how these changes are impacting grid reliability, supply resources and planning the electric...

Collaboration between the industry and government will be paramount to maintain robust wholesale markets and ensure grid reliability as the state continues to promote rapid development of renewable resources in the coming year. That was the message from NYISO President and CEO Rich Dewey on the latest Power Trends podcast. In episode 38, Dewey reflected on his annual “State of the Grid” message to...

As temperatures drop, New Yorkers turn up their thermostats and demand for electricity rises. In anticipation of the cold season, the NYISO Operations team develops a winter preparedness report that evaluates the ability of the grid to meet demand on the coldest days of the year. The NYISO’s 2024-25 Winter Assessment considers load forecast, the capacity of generators, the transmission system, and...

How will the demand for electricity, a changing generation mix, and the transmission system evolve over the next 10 years? This is the question that our Reliability Needs Assessment (RNA) examines in order to assess and identify impacts to reliability. In the latest Power Trends podcast, Senior VP of System & Resource Planning Zach Smith dives deep into the 2024 RNA to explain how the NYISO an...

As the diversity and scale of energy resources have evolved in recent years, NYISO’s market design team has been working hard to create and implement market innovations to support those technologies. The most recent example of NYISO's commitment to innovation is the launch of a first-in-the nation program to integrate aggregations of distributed energy resources (DER) into the wholesale elect...

Our mission at the NYISO is to ensure power system reliability and competitive markets for New York in a clean-energy future, and to work with all stakeholders to build the cleanest, most reliable electric system in the nation.  In keeping with our mission, we operate a capacity market to meet resource adequacy requirements and serve consumer demand. The capacity market acts as a transparent and c...

When we talk about building a more sustainable future, the journey is as important as the destination. Steering the electric grid through these monumental changes requires leadership and creativity.  As the NYISO’s Director of Grid Transition, Udayan Nair oversees the integration of new elements of the industry into our operations and planning functions and works to facilitate coordination across...

What does the path to a decarbonized grid by 2040 look like? Dr. C. Lindsay Anderson of Cornell University is working to answer the question of where best on the grid to incorporate large amounts of new generation on the future grid to achieve optimal performance.  Anderson is chair of Cornell’s Department of Biological & Environmental Engineering. Her research focuses on creating detailed mod...

Columbia University’s Daniel Zarrilli knows a thing or two about New York City and the effects of climate change. For almost a decade prior to Hurricane Sandy, he worked on the city’s waterfront, managing maintenance and construction of the city’s piers and bulkheads, overseeing cruise terminals and other maritime assets, and working with coastal communities on a variety of local projects. That ex...

You might say Nicole Bouchez’s role as the NYISO’s Consumer Interest Liaison and Senior Principal Economist combines deep data analytics with good, old-fashioned customer service.  She has an especially important responsibility evaluating the impacts of major market design changes for stakeholders, policymakers, and market participants. That’s where her PhD in International Economics comes in hand...

In this episode of our Power Trends podcast, Julie Tighe discusses her role leading the New York League of Conservation Voters, and her recent addition to the NYISO’s Environmental Advisory Council (EAC). The EAC, which was formed in 2005, provides information and analysis on state and federal environmental policies relative to NYISO’s mission of grid reliability. “No one is going to be happy if t...

New York’s recent peak day for electricity consumption came during a heatwave, as millions of people relied on their air conditioners to keep cool. That’s not unusual. However, some of the circumstances leading up to that day still provided a challenge. On our latest Power Trends podcast, NYISO’s Vice President of Operations Aaron Markham discusses what goes into maintaining a reliable grid during...

In our latest podcast, we sat down with Rana Mukerji, NYISO’s SVP of Market Structures, to learn about his journey from growing up in Calcutta, India to becoming widely regarded as one of the ­­industry's leading designers of electricity markets. We ask Rana about his past career experience working for General Electric and ABB, and how the markets must evolve to accommodate a new set of renew...

Episode 26 of the Power Trends podcast delivers a change of pace for our listeners. In this episode, NYISO market mitigation economist Michelle Merlis discusses her long and challenging path to becoming a world-class trail runner.  While Michelle's early years found her on the basketball court, she discovered her passion for competitive running while earning a master’s degree in agricultural...

“The objective is the reliability of the grid,” VP of System & Resource Planning Zach Smith says about the process his group oversees studying the impacts of connecting new electric resources to the grid. Because of state policies and technological advancements, more developers are seeking to connect to the grid, creating more demands on the New York ISO in overseeing the study process. Smith...

In our latest Power Trends Podcast , we interview two leading Energy Information Administration (EIA) analysts about the impact of wholesale natural gas prices on winter electricity costs in New York. We spoke to Dr. Tyler Hodge, Senior Economist in the Office of Energy Analysis, and Corrina Ricker, a Certified Data Scientist on the Natural Gas Markets team, to dive into the findings of EIA’s late...

Every five minutes, 24 hours a day, electricity in New York State is bought and sold through competitive wholesale electric markets administered by the NYISO. And while we may not think about electricity the same way we do about other products and services, competitive wholesale electric markets are truly dynamic, with hundreds of buyers and sellers, or “market participants,” involved in the proce...

The NYISO recently released a new report that identifies the unprecedented level of electrical system investment necessary to achieve New York State’s climate policy requirements. Developed in collaboration with stakeholders and state agencies, the 2021-2040 System and Resource Outlook (the Outlook) uses various scenarios to identify potential pathways for transmission and supply investments that...

In our latest Power Trends Podcast, we interviewed two leading U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) analysts about domestic and international price trends and how world energy supply and demand are impacting wholesale electricity prices in New York.   We spoke to Dr. Tyler Hodge, Senior Economist in the Office of Energy Analysis, and Corrina Ricker, a Certified Data Scientist on the Natura...

It’s going to take time and precision to build the grid of the future. Managing reliability carefully and investing in the right technologies as we transition to a grid increasingly based on clean energy will be key to success. These are the messages of Dr. Karen Wayland, a noted policy expert who focuses on the path to grid modernization and infrastructure improvements aimed at a cleaner, more ef...