What Just Happened? Texas

Seeing the so-called news coverage about the blizzard and power outages in Texas, I wanted to do (another) post criticizing all the partisan hot-takes exploiting a natural disaster (also a man-made one, to boot!) to play politics. You know, those blaming “fragile green power” (the GOP), “Red States” (Democrats), or “unbridled capitalism” (Democratic Socialists), to name a few.

Instead, I decided to start another occasional series (What Just Happened, or perhaps WJH?) to give as straightforward as possible a review of some recent event. For the purposes of being as objective as possible, this will never be as instantaneous as a Tweet-storm, but it should be much more factual.

So what just happened in Texas? First and foremost, a snow and ice storm. Now Texans all know that the state gets snow and ice. Even a Yankee like me remembers a January 1st Dallas ice storm as the backdrop for the infamous Joe Montana “chicken soup” game when Notre Dame scored twenty-three points in the final eight minutes to beat the Houston Cougars in the 1979 Cotton Bowl.

So these storms are not normal, but are not rare. In fact, similar blizzards caused similar outages in 1989 and again in 2011.

Texans like to claim their state is unique, and when it comes to energy, they are right. Texas was the first big energy producing state, and to this day remains the largest US energy-producing state. Back in the 20th century, when electrification was all the rage, Texas was the first to build electricity-sharing networks. Texas looked at its own growth potential, the (then) weak energy potential of its neighbors, the federal government which claimed jurisdiction over interstate energy associations, and decided: we’ll go it alone! So all Texas (less San Antonio and parts of the Panhandle) is on its own, separate electricity network.

How did that work out? Pretty well; for the next seventy years, Texas had plenty of energy to fuel a building boom while enjoying some of the cheapest energy prices anywhere. Texas electricity rates are among the lowest in the nation. They averaged (before the blizzard) about 11 cents per kilowatt hour, although even residential users could find wholesale providers at rates as low as 5 cents per kilowatt hour! ((Note: wholesale providers are advising residential customers to immediately change providers, as now they are charging rates–high demand, low supply–that result in thousand dollar bills!)) Houston went from a small town to the 4th largest US city, and Houstonians could run their air conditioners all-day, most of the year, and pretend the city wasn’t built partially over a swamp.

After the 1965 East Coast blackout, Texas created the Electric Reliability Council of Texas or ERCOT. As the name implies, this non-profit was supposed to ensure Texans never faced a blackout. Over its history, ERCOT was relatively successful: Texas experienced major heat waves (when electricity consumption is at absolute peak) but never a heat-wave induced blackout. But Texas did experience blizzard-induced blackouts in 1989 and 2011. ERCOT was supposed to ensure lessons learned from 2011, along with the introduction of renewable sources (wind and solar) would prevent another blizzard blackout.

The problem in the summer is that electricity demand peaks. People (generally) keep their homes cool even when they’re not there, and of course the offices, stores and restaurants must keep cool too. The advantage is that hot weather generally does not affect electric power generation capacity. Some generative capacity can surge-on-demand (nuclear, natural gas, coal; wind and solar vary, but generally cannot be surged on demand). So the power authority surges to meet demand and there is no problem. Or, the power authority asks others in its network to share additional energy, and still no problem . . . except for Texas, which has no one else with whom to share.

Winter generally has less demand, so normally any increase in demand can be covered by surge, even in Texas. But, or should I say BUT, winter can affect those surge systems. Water pipes (at nuclear plants) or gas lines freeze. Tanker trucks get stuck. Wind turbines freeze. Snow covers solar panels (briefly) or falling snow blocks the sun. Meanwhile, people are stuck in their homes which may not be adequately insulated.

The New York Times created an excellent graphic (they had to ruin it with their explanatory article) showing day-by-day electrical power production under ERCOT:

You can clearly see several things:

• Natural gas not only did not surge, it dropped significantly.
• Coal, too experienced a small drop.
• Even nuclear had a small drop due to one plant’s closure.
• Wind dropped by the greatest percentage and slowly recovered (no, it didn’t cause the blackout).
• Solar actually surged, although only in the daylight hours (duh).

Ever wonder why there was a system blackout when the graph shows some power being generated at all times? Power distribution systems are designed to run within tolerances. When demand greatly exceeds electric supply, surges happen which can result in component failures, fires, even explosions. Thus when things get really bad, it’s always better for the power authority to shut it down than risk having to replace costly, perhaps rare systems. That’s a worst case for which they’re prepared.

Several folks have voiced criticisms like “why did turbines freeze in Texas and not in Alaska?” or “why do solar panels work in space, but not Texas?” The second one is too stupid to be believed (it’s not the cold, it’s the snow; there is no snow in space). But the first hints at the problem: gas and water lines, turbines, and delivery vehicles can be winterized, and they were supposed to be. But they weren’t. We don’t know yet why.

Before we jump to the obvious conclusion, consider one more thing: the paradox of worst-case planning. How much do you spend preparing for the worst case? Texas experienced three outages, lasting less than two weeks total, over the last thirty-two years. In the meantime, the daily headline (for over eleven thousand days) was “Texas has the nation’s cheapest energy.” Winterization is cost effective, but not cheap. Any company which went ahead and did it was at a cost disadvantage to others in Texas as they passed along the costs to their customers. The same people attacking the Texas government had nothing but sympathy for Puerto Rico, where Prepa failed to plan for hurricanes which are far more frequent. The American federal government continues to subsidize the rebuilding of homes in flood plains rather than force homeowners to move in order to qualify. Sometimes government acts like a bad parent that lets the kids have candy before dinner.

What about the moral costs of failing to prepare? Twenty-two (at last count) Texans died due to the blizzard, millions were seriously affected, and some even needed to flee (that’s for you, Senator Cruz!). Yet in bluest of blue Illinois, where blizzards are an annual event, eleven people died due to the storm, and millions were affected, and so on. Blizzards kill people and destroy property for the same reason viruses spread: that’s what they do.

So what just happened in Texas? A rare but not unprecedented winter storm, perhaps a type becoming more common. A long-ago policy decision restricted options. The State government failed to confirm whether systems were winterized; we’ll know eventually whether they were mislead or incompetent. Networks proved (once again) to be more robust, although some engineers have pointed out the larger US western electrical network also experienced rolling blackouts, and if Texas had been attached to it, the entire system might have collapsed! Finally, preparation is less costly than recovery . . . if the worst case happens.

Oh, we can certainly confirm hindsight remains 20/20, and politics is always in play.