ERCOT's sustained load records put $2.80 gas on the wrong side of Texas demand
Weekly ERCOT loads ran 10% above last summer's peak averages, a signal supply-focused gas traders appear to be discounting.
NYMEX Henry Hub front-month is trading at $2.80/MMBtu on September 9 (2026-09-09), pinned by U.S. gas production running near 115 billion cubic feet per day. The supply story is real. But EIA data published September 3 (2026-09-03) show ERCOT's weekly average load for the week ending August 22 (2026-08-22) ran 10% above the highest weekly average recorded during all of summer 2025 and 6% above the previous record — not a one-day spike at peak heat but a full week of elevated consumption.7
The week ending August 29 (2026-08-29) averaged 73.7 GW, just below the record-setting week but still above any prior comparable period, according to EIA.7 Sustained demand at those levels differs structurally from a single-day peak, and that distinction has not moved NYMEX Henry Hub.
The anchor for the current records came on July 22 (2026-07-22), when ERCOT's hourly load hit 91.089 GW — a 6% jump from the previous all-time high of 85.508 GW set on August 10, 2023, according to ERCOT data cited by EIA.4 Before that, the record was 80.148 GW, set July 20, 2022.4 Three successive summers, each raising the peak by 5-7%. That is the pattern.
At the July 22 (2026-07-22) peak, gas-fired generation met 48% of ERCOT's load, with solar providing 32%, EIA data show.3 At 91 GW of total load with gas holding nearly half the stack, the implied dispatch volumes are large. If ERCOT's load floor is rising structurally rather than seasonally, gas burn in Texas is rising with it. $2.80 NYMEX Henry Hub front-month does not obviously reflect that.
ERCOT grid reserves have already tightened. NERC's Summer Reliability Assessment showed reserves narrowing from 34% to 29%, driven by roughly 1.9% demand growth with no substantial addition to net internal supply.1 NERC flagged high potential for insufficient operating reserves under normal peak conditions — a threshold that July's actual load exceeded.1
The data center queue adds the forward dimension. ERCOT told stakeholders in August (2026-08-20) that it intends to complete an audit of hundreds of data center interconnection proposals by December 10 (2026-12-10), a prerequisite for its Batch Zero study process and for large load interconnections to resume.6 Texas Governor Greg Abbott ordered the review on August 3 (2026-08-03).6 Until the audit clears, a significant block of committed demand sits off the metered load count. It will eventually appear in EIA's hourly data, and it will push weekly averages higher.
Ascend Analytics projects ERCOT peak demand could reach 120 GW by 2030, more than 30% above July's record — though that figure comes in below ERCOT's own internal forecasts, Utility Dive reported.5 ERCOT CEO Pablo Vegas acknowledged in June (2026-06-02) that prior estimates of 228 GW in queue load materializing by 2032 were "too high of a figure based on realistic expectations."2 But a heavily discounted pipeline still implies gas turbines as marginal generators in Texas for years ahead.
Dan Woodfin, ERCOT's vice president of system operations, said demand could breach 92 GW given hotter-than-normal weather combined with additional contributions from crypto mining and data centers.2 That threshold sits close enough to July's 91.089 GW that a second breach this summer or early next looks less like an outlier and more like a new baseline being established.
Southwest Power Pool reached a record 57.9 GW on July 27 (2026-07-27) at 5:00 p.m., EIA data show — a sign elevated demand this summer extends beyond Texas.3 For gas traders, load records in adjacent grids reinforce rather than dilute the ERCOT signal.
The supply case for $2.80 NYMEX Henry Hub is well-constructed: 115 Bcf per day of production has capped every rally this summer. But ERCOT's September weekly average loads are the number to track. If load retreats to 2025 norms once September heat fades, the demand surge was weather and the bears are right. But if ERCOT's weekly average holds materially above prior-summer baselines through milder weeks, the demand trend has moved faster than supply-side positioning acknowledges, and $2.80 is pricing Texas power demand too lightly.