Total (Planned Outage) Recall: A Look Inside PJM’s October 13th Price Spike

Usually when PJM’s Western Hub sees hourly real-time Locational Marginal Prices (LMPs) above $1500/MWh, it is because the system is experiencing high levels of demand driven by hot or cold temperatures or extreme gas prices. So why then with a peak load of 108 GW (well below the summer peak of 162 GW on July 2) did we see such an extreme real-time price spike on October 13?