By Mariel Gousios
With the recent winter storm in Texas, over 4 million households lost their homes. Homes flooded, pipes burst, and natural gas power plants froze. Texas received less than a foot of snow, however, the whole state seemingly broke down.
The reason for this is partly because Texas is on its own power grid. Unlike every other state, other state’s electricity generation doesn’t contribute to powering Texan homes. When Texas was in its time of need no one else could bail them out by producing extra electricity.
Additionally, the state continuously ignored reports which instructed them to prepare their various power plants for the weather. After a similar storm in 2011, power plants were instructed to add multiple weatherizing additions, such as insulation, windbreaks, and heaters, to keep the plants running during extreme weather conditions. However, little progress was made, resulting in the shutdown of oil and natural gas plants when another storm came.
The extremity of the storm was also severely underestimated by ERCOT, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas. Power plants weren’t aware that the conditions were going to be that severe so there wasn’t enough energy reserved for future use. The result was a surge in energy prices, leaving many Texans with thousands of dollars to pay for their electricity grid.
The sad conclusion is that most of this could’ve been avoided. With the weatherizing of power plants and a more diverse electrical plan, fewer homes would’ve gone powerless. Hopefully, in the future, the legislation in Texas will implement plants to prevent something this drastic from happening again.
