[sampo]

> California's demand commonly goes from 18GW to 30GW in the same day.

That extreme intra-day variation is also partially caused by California's cheap solar power: Cheaper prices draw demand to those hours.

In other locations, (some) people (partially) adjust their consumption patters to follow the cheap wind energy hours, and this leads to different consumption patters. Less intra-day variation but but inter-day variation.

If California's prices were wind-dominated (typically a little more wind at nightime), or nuclear or burning dominated (stable), it would not cause such large variation in the intra-day consumption pattern.

This electricity price figure is readable, but 10 years old, so today the variation in California must be larger than it shows:

https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=32172