After watching portions of the two days of committee hearings on the power grid failure, I searched for Rep. Drew Darby's take on what he'd learned. Darby believes bringing more minds to the table will help.
CBS DFW reported:
Republican state Rep. Drew Darby, who sits on the House Energy Resources Committee that is digging into the outages.
His rural district includes two or three homes in the Texas oil patch that burned down as the power lurched off and on, and he heard of plants that couldn't burn piles of frozen coal outside. Even before the storm dropped six inches of snow as far south as San Antonio, generators in Texas were required to submit safeguard plans for cold weather. Darby suspects enforcement was scant.
“Typically, you know, the Texas Legislature pushes back on overregulation; Darby said. “However, my view on something as basic to human survival and need is we need to have reliable power and water.
Darby spoke with 6News after the public hearings:
"Certainly communication was one of the great failings of this incident," Darby said. "Communication and lack of regulatory oversight in spite of legislative direction."
It has become clear over the last few weeks that freezing weather had caused many outages at power plants across Texas. Neither ERCOT nor the PUC had power to enforce any such winterization regulations, but it was the lack of solutions and clear answers from agency leaders that had Darby and other lawmakers concerned.
"I sensed a total, especially with the PUC, a detachment if you will," Darby said. "From the questions we were asking to the responses we were given, the vagueness and elusiveness of some of the responses, the lack of information and clear direction the agency had, was very troublesome."
The system did what it was designed to do by the Texas Legislature. It failed millions while overcharging, even price gouging in a crisis. Political appointees dodging responsibility in a crisis is an age ole tradition.
Darby said frozen infrastructure in the natural gas pumps, pipelines and plants was clearly an issue that needed to be addressed. ERCOT's Magness would not give personal recommendations on how such preparations could be regulated Thursday.
Darby told 6 News the PUC would need to be given authority to enforce such measures, though he didn't know what the complete solution should look like.
"I think clearly we've got to establish what those weatherization or winterization standards are and then we need to have the PUC implement those standards and make sure that generators follow those standards," Darby said. "Follow up with enforcement. Follow up with verification."
Another issue was the lack of reserve power available in Texas for when the grid is in danger of falling short. Darby said Texas has a reserve margin of only 13 percent. He did not know if that was actually required by the state or if it was another voluntary "best practice" that may or may not be followed by ERCOT.
Darby shared a stage with Rep. Hugh Shine at a Temple town hall:
One factor in the lengthy power outages for thousands of Texans was failure of operators to winterize generating plants.
“We’ve made choices to prepare for the extraordinary hot summers we have here in Texas that we have every year, absolutely we prepare for that and they prepare for that,” Darby said.
But what he says they weren’t prepared for, was a winter storm as long and widespread as the historic freeze.
“We’re going to change that dynamic so there’s a lot of talk about what we can do and will do and what we have the appetite to do,” he said.
Darby says another problem was communication.
He says ERCOT had to have seen the issues with the power grid coming, but left Texans in the dark in terms of information.
“There was a failure, an utter failure, to communicate that this was not a rolling blackout situation as that term was used, your power was going to be off for a period of time.”
It was millions of Texans without power, not thousands.
The public awaits change and the opportunity to hold accountable those responsible for going days without power in life threatening conditions. At least fifty seven Texas died during the winter storm, most from hypothermia.
Update 3-21-21: Neither the Texas Legislature nor the Texas Supreme Court chose to deal with Grid Failure. Markets win, citizens lose.
A move in Texas to wipe out more than $4 billion in electricity overcharges from last month’s devastating blackouts appears dead in the water after deeply divided lawmakers left town without taking final action on the proposal.
Immunity from accountability wins, citizens lose.
The all-Republican high court split 5 to 4, with the majority deciding that a legal technicality prevented it from weighing in on the Electric Reliability Council of Texas’s claim to governmental immunity in a case that predated the February disaster. As a result, a lower court ruling granting government immunity to Ercot stands for now.
Piss poor leaders gave Texans a system that not only failed millions but overcharged in a time of crisis. That system remains firmly in place.
Update 5-16-24: Rep. Drew Darby voted for Texans to pick up the tab for outrageous energy bills generated during the widespread grid failure.
"A newly-created Texas Electric Securitization Corp. would use the money raised from the fees for bonds to help pay the companies’ debts, including costs for ancillary services, a financial product that helps ensure power is continuously generated. The aid would only be allowed for the debt that would otherwise be defaulted."
Will Texas Congressional representatives pick up the tab for expenses incurred as result of the power loss? No. So why should we pick up the bill for their badly failed system?
Update 11-29-21: Texas has done “next to nothing” to weatherize its natural gas supply which would result in major power outages should the state experience another long term freeze.
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