On Aug. 21, the US solar eclipse was set to keep the sun from fully powering 1,900 utility-scale solar photovoltaic plants across the country, leading to a shortfall of up to 21,650 megawatts of solar power. But just as they do every night when the sun goes down or when clouds cover the sun, the grid operators handled the rapid ramping up and down of solar power by turning to other types of power.
The California Independent System Operator, which manages the California grid, had no problems with the rapid drop of solar power of 70 to 80 MW of generation per minute during the height of the eclipse in the state. Indeed, the change was minor compared with the 13,000 MW drop in solar power that the grid operator has had to manage when the sun goes down.