The power failed in Texas. On one of the coldest days in Texas in recorded history, the power failed in Texas. Millions were left without power and heat as the cold and snow froze Texas. In Houston, people were erecting tents inside their own bedrooms in hopes of containing body heat with temperature in the teens. Casualties seem inevitable, but even if all Texans somehow come through unscathed, this will have been an avoidable embarrassment. Yet Republicans are all too happy to shift the blame to pretty much anyone else.
The opening salvo has thrown blame upon two parties. The first – and in my opinion most despicable – is blaming consumers for not appropriately following consumption restrictions or for not appropriately preparing for power outages. For example, Colorado City, TX mayor attacked his constituents for failing to properly prepare for such a circumstance, accusing those expecting electricity of being socialists and part of the problem. I shouldn’t need to explain why this is an awful take, but in today’s day and age, it’s probably best to still spell it out. Not only do Colorado City residents pay for their utilities, but it is not unreasonable to expect a developed nation to ensure that basic necessities are met.
What is more concerning, however, is the blame cast upon green energy. A popular mantra, spread by conservative mouth pieces such as Tucker Carlson, is that the acceptance of green energy, namely wind power in their formulation, is the cause of these blackouts. According to them, the freezing of wind turbine blades caused those turbines to be taken offline, which led to an overloading of the grid and thus blackouts. This is a compelling story at first glance, and like many lies, it contains a kernel of truth. Indeed, wind turbines, primarily in West Texas, did freeze and go offline. And this certainly did contribute to the lack of power the caused cascading blackouts. Similarly, my inability to text her contributes to me not being married to Scarlett Johansson.
As it turns out, wind power actually exceeded the expectations of the Texas power grid operators, ERCOT. ERCOT expected wind power to go down in these conditions. The reason why is obvious. Texas power producers haven’t bothered to winterize the wind turbines. Essentially, in a winter storm condition, Texas expects its wind turbines to produce at around 10% of their max capacity. In actuality, they performed at about 25% capacity, in part due to the strong winds that brought in the cold.
The real issue is that natural gas – and even coal – drastically underperformed. Natural gas power plants were not able to receive the gas or the supercritical steam necessary to run the plants, in both instances because the pipes were too cold to transport those fluids. Coal plants went offline due to instruments that were too cold to function. This led to an underproduction of thousands of megawatts and led to blackouts for millions of Texans. It turns out that renewables are not the problem. Wind turbines in the upper Midwest continued to work despite colder temperatures. Hydropower worked for the Tennessee Valley Authority. The inability for Texas to generate power was caused by cold weather and a failure to winterize their grid.
Now I know what you might be thinking. How much can we fault Texas for failing to be prepared to deal with single digit temperatures? After all, this was the coldest it has been in Texas in decades. While there is some truth to that, this is not the first time Texas’s power grid has been stressed by cold weather, nor even the first time in recent memory. In 2011, rolling blackouts occurred after winter weather knocked natural gas and coal power plants offline, while ERCOT nearly resorted to that step in 2014. Clearly the need was there, but the will was not.
Of course, Texas is in a unique position of being particularly vulnerable to such events. Due to Texas’s unfounded fears of federal regulations and fervor for private profit, most of Texas’s power grid is disconnected from the rest of the United States. When other states lose the ability to produce electricity, they can tap into large grids (there are three major power grids in the continental United States – the Western Interconnection, the Eastern Interconnection, and the Texas Interconnection. It gets a little more complicated with regional providers, but broadly speaking there are three). Texas cannot. We can see the risk of such a system when comparing a map of blackouts to a map of the Texas Interconnection. When politicians such as Texas Governor Greg Abbott or Representative Dan Crenshaw fearmonger about federal regulations or the Green New Deal, know that this is a lie. Instead, federal regulations would have required greater energy reserves to prevent these events from occurring or from being as severe if they do occur.
In Texas, the problem was derived from years of Republican politicians in power, including current Gov. Abbott and former Texas Governor and Secretary of Energy Rick Perry (ironic, isn’t it?), placing private profit over public preparedness. Energy barons have cashed in by being able to ignore federal safeguards. Now those same Republicans are seeking to divert blame elsewhere, and since Democrats cannot be blamed for statewide problems in Texas, Democratic causes such as combating climate change, are placed in the crosshairs. Rather than fix the problems they’ve created, Republicans continue to lie and deflect, while leaving the average Texan out in the cold.
The opening salvo has thrown blame upon two parties. The first – and in my opinion most despicable – is blaming consumers for not appropriately following consumption restrictions or for not appropriately preparing for power outages. For example, Colorado City, TX mayor attacked his constituents for failing to properly prepare for such a circumstance, accusing those expecting electricity of being socialists and part of the problem. I shouldn’t need to explain why this is an awful take, but in today’s day and age, it’s probably best to still spell it out. Not only do Colorado City residents pay for their utilities, but it is not unreasonable to expect a developed nation to ensure that basic necessities are met.
What is more concerning, however, is the blame cast upon green energy. A popular mantra, spread by conservative mouth pieces such as Tucker Carlson, is that the acceptance of green energy, namely wind power in their formulation, is the cause of these blackouts. According to them, the freezing of wind turbine blades caused those turbines to be taken offline, which led to an overloading of the grid and thus blackouts. This is a compelling story at first glance, and like many lies, it contains a kernel of truth. Indeed, wind turbines, primarily in West Texas, did freeze and go offline. And this certainly did contribute to the lack of power the caused cascading blackouts. Similarly, my inability to text her contributes to me not being married to Scarlett Johansson.
As it turns out, wind power actually exceeded the expectations of the Texas power grid operators, ERCOT. ERCOT expected wind power to go down in these conditions. The reason why is obvious. Texas power producers haven’t bothered to winterize the wind turbines. Essentially, in a winter storm condition, Texas expects its wind turbines to produce at around 10% of their max capacity. In actuality, they performed at about 25% capacity, in part due to the strong winds that brought in the cold.
The real issue is that natural gas – and even coal – drastically underperformed. Natural gas power plants were not able to receive the gas or the supercritical steam necessary to run the plants, in both instances because the pipes were too cold to transport those fluids. Coal plants went offline due to instruments that were too cold to function. This led to an underproduction of thousands of megawatts and led to blackouts for millions of Texans. It turns out that renewables are not the problem. Wind turbines in the upper Midwest continued to work despite colder temperatures. Hydropower worked for the Tennessee Valley Authority. The inability for Texas to generate power was caused by cold weather and a failure to winterize their grid.
Now I know what you might be thinking. How much can we fault Texas for failing to be prepared to deal with single digit temperatures? After all, this was the coldest it has been in Texas in decades. While there is some truth to that, this is not the first time Texas’s power grid has been stressed by cold weather, nor even the first time in recent memory. In 2011, rolling blackouts occurred after winter weather knocked natural gas and coal power plants offline, while ERCOT nearly resorted to that step in 2014. Clearly the need was there, but the will was not.
Of course, Texas is in a unique position of being particularly vulnerable to such events. Due to Texas’s unfounded fears of federal regulations and fervor for private profit, most of Texas’s power grid is disconnected from the rest of the United States. When other states lose the ability to produce electricity, they can tap into large grids (there are three major power grids in the continental United States – the Western Interconnection, the Eastern Interconnection, and the Texas Interconnection. It gets a little more complicated with regional providers, but broadly speaking there are three). Texas cannot. We can see the risk of such a system when comparing a map of blackouts to a map of the Texas Interconnection. When politicians such as Texas Governor Greg Abbott or Representative Dan Crenshaw fearmonger about federal regulations or the Green New Deal, know that this is a lie. Instead, federal regulations would have required greater energy reserves to prevent these events from occurring or from being as severe if they do occur.
In Texas, the problem was derived from years of Republican politicians in power, including current Gov. Abbott and former Texas Governor and Secretary of Energy Rick Perry (ironic, isn’t it?), placing private profit over public preparedness. Energy barons have cashed in by being able to ignore federal safeguards. Now those same Republicans are seeking to divert blame elsewhere, and since Democrats cannot be blamed for statewide problems in Texas, Democratic causes such as combating climate change, are placed in the crosshairs. Rather than fix the problems they’ve created, Republicans continue to lie and deflect, while leaving the average Texan out in the cold.