Figure

ERCOT daily peak load against its standing record, July 14 to 25, 2026

ERCOT's telemetry came within 231 MW of the 85,508 MW settlement-basis record on July 20, then crossed it on July 21 and July 22, while the day's highest hourly nodal P95 fell from $362 to $47/MWh.

Two-panel chart. The top panel plots ERCOT daily peak load on a telemetry basis from July 14 to 25, 2026, climbing from 69,005 MW on July 14 to a plateau that sits around the 85,508 MW settlement-meter record standing since August 10, 2023. July 20 reads 85,277 MW, 231 MW short at 99.7% of the record and marked with a hollow point; July 21 crosses at 87,403 MW and July 22 at 91,089 MW, both marked with filled amber points; the three following days hold at 98.4 to 98.9% of the record. The bottom panel plots each day's highest hourly nodal P95, reaching $362/MWh on July 22 and then falling to $47 by July 25 while daily peak demand stayed within 1.6% of the standing record.

This figure is from the ERCOT July 2026 heat-wave case study, a primary-source reconstruction of an all-time demand record crossed on a week without record heat, and what the public record does and does not show about it.

Cite this figure

Corey Balgeman, "ERCOT daily peak load against its standing record, July 14 to 25, 2026," Grid Flexibility, 2026. https://gridflexibility.fyi/case-studies/ercot-heat-wave-july-2026/figures/ercot-record-arc

Licensed CC BY 4.0: free to republish with attribution. License details.

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Last updated: 2026-08-05.