Texas largely relies on natural gas for power. It wasn’t ready for the extreme cold.

[thackney]

Texas largely relies on natural gas for power. It wasn’t ready for the extreme cold.
https://www.texastribune.org/2021/02/16/natural-gas-power-storm/
FEB. 16, 2021

Failures across Texas’ natural gas operations and supply chains due to extreme temperatures are the most significant cause of the power crisis that has left millions of Texans without heat and electricity during the winter storm sweeping the U.S.

From frozen natural gas wells to frozen wind turbines, all sources of power generation have faced difficulties during the winter storm. But Texans largely rely on natural gas for power and heat generation, especially during peak usage, experts said.

Officials for the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which manages most of Texas’ grid, said the primary cause of the outages Tuesday appeared to be the state’s natural gas providers. Many are not designed to withstand such low temperatures on equipment or during production.

By some estimates, nearly half of the state’s natural gas production has screeched to a halt due to the extremely low temperatures, while freezing components at natural gas-fired power plants have forced some operators to shut down....

[catfish1957]

Interesting that we had similar cold in 1983 and 1989, without this level of power distruptions....

As far as culprits, here are a few that speculatively come to mind....

1. Complaceny in freeze protection design and standards in facilities, due to event rarity
2. Lack of operator experience in dealing with emergency freeze conditions
3. Loss of west Tx wind turbines incrementally caused a dominoing outage based on over taxing NG power plants
4. Huge population growth since last '80's freezes, and infrastructure didn't keep pace

[Cyber Liberty]

3. Loss of west Tx wind turbines incrementally caused a dominoing outage based on over taxing NG power plants

The environuts are working overtime to debunk this.....

[thackney]

Interesting that we had similar cold in 1983 and 1989, without this level of power distruptions....

As far as culprits, here are a few that speculatively come to mind....

1. Complaceny in freeze protection design and standards in facilities, due to event rarity
2. Lack of operator experience in dealing with emergency freeze conditions
3. Loss of west Tx wind turbines incrementally caused a dominoing outage based on over taxing NG power plants
4. Huge population growth since last '80's freezes, and infrastructure didn't keep pace

1, 2 Yes indeed
3, that is not how it works.  We did loose a significant wind turbine amount but that does not take out NatGas (or any other) plants.  Power plants only put out their capacity.  Ercot forces shedding of load (customers) when the demand reaches the generation capacity.
4, We have capacity to meet demand.  But the lost of so much generation, included some scheduled maintenance because Ercot did not think demand would be this high is the problem.

[Bigun]

The environuts are working overtime to debunk this.....

"Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclination, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."

--John Adams

[Victoria33]

Interesting that we had similar cold in 1983 and 1989, without this level of power distruptions....
As far as culprits, here are a few that speculatively come to mind....
1. Complaceny in freeze protection design and standards in facilities, due to event rarity
2. Lack of operator experience in dealing with emergency freeze conditions
3. Loss of west Tx wind turbines incrementally caused a dominoing outage based on over taxing NG power plants
4. Huge population growth since last '80's freezes, and infrastructure didn't keep pace

@catfish1957

Thank you, those are the exact reasons we are in this situation.  Last Friday, I asked Bob to quickly shop and get certain items which he did.  I told him (he is from up north) Texas is "south" and "south" does not build water infrastructure and power infrastructure for prolonged 20 to 0 long term (as in weeks) temperatures.  I put a "Water Bob" in one of our bathroom tubs and filled it - that is drinkable water out of one of our faucets.

It happened like I knew it would - power "connections" froze and power failed.  Main water pipes froze and cities could not deliver water to customers.

This was the first time in modern history this has happened to all in Texas.  When this is over, there will be changes to power and water supply sources - if this can happen once here, it can happen again.  Now, "Hello north, tell us how you prevent freezing of your vital resources for keeping people alive."

Hmm, need to see if Austin, where Gov. Abbott lives, has no power or rolling power...

[IsailedawayfromFR]

Texas largely relies on natural gas for power. It wasn’t ready for the extreme cold.

I have always felt that the very best power generation fuel is coal.

It can be stockpiled into a mountain right next to the plant so does not have to be transported in an emergency such as natural gas which can have a pipeline freezing issue.

And in a pinch it can be hauled into the fireplace to burn to generate heat for warmth and cooking.

[Victoria33]

@catfish1957

It appears Gov. Abbott has blackouts as most everyone does in Austin:

"In the Austin area, emergency crews have been flooded with calls out about broken water pipes and roughly 40% of Austin Energy customers are without power due to so-called rolling blackouts. Residents have been asked to conserve their own power usage, too."

[Hoodat]

Now, "Hello north, tell us how you prevent freezing of your vital resources for keeping people alive."

First and foremost, they don't rely on wind or solar power.  But they waste no time lecturing the rest of us about how we should be switching to it.

[Bigun]

Texas largely relies on natural gas for power. It wasn’t ready for the extreme cold.

I have always felt that the very best power generation fuel is coal.

It can be stockpiled into a mountain right next to the plant so does not have to be transported in an emergency such as natural gas which can have a pipeline freezing issue.

And in a pinch it can be hauled into the fireplace to burn to generate heat for warmth and cooking.

I differ with you here @IsailedawayfromFR . IMHO the best choice for power generation is nuclear in most locations but that isn't pc so that is a no go.

[catfish1957]

@catfish1957

It appears Gov. Abbott has blackouts as most everyone does in Austin:

"In the Austin area, emergency crews have been flooded with calls out about broken water pipes and roughly 40% of Austin Energy customers are without power due to so-called rolling blackouts. Residents have been asked to conserve their own power usage, too."

Abbott will incur more political damage on this one, more than any else.  Interesting how he responds in the next two years.

[thackney]

I have always felt that the very best power generation fuel is coal.

It can be stockpiled into a mountain right next to the plant so does not have to be transported in an emergency such as natural gas which can have a pipeline freezing issue.

While there was some problems with our Texas coal generation (frozen instruments, water systems, etc)  It would have helped a lot to have more coal plants, even our Lignite (dirt that burns) plants.

It is frustrating how this week is a duplication of first week in Feb, 2011; but with much bigger numbers.

Report on Outages and Curtailments During the Southwest Cold Weather Event of February 1-5, 2011
https://www.ferc.gov/sites/default/files/2020-04/08-16-11-report.pdf

[IsailedawayfromFR]

I differ with you here @IsailedawayfromFR . IMHO the best choice for power generation is nuclear in most locations but that isn't pc so that is a no go.

I certainly don't discount nuclear's utility to generate vast amounts of power and support its broad usage.

They are more prone for catastrophic accidents though such as Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima.  You won't find similar catastrophes for coal which is the reason I like coal.  Besides, one can burn coal in your fireplace, not uranium isotopes.

[Bigun]

I certainly don't discount nuclear's utility to generate vast amounts of power and support its broad usage.

They are more prone for catastrophic accidents though such as Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima.  You won't find similar catastrophes for coal which is the reason I like coal.  Besides, one can burn coal in your fireplace, not uranium isotopes.

I'm not opposed to coal either, especially in areas susceptible to earthquakes, but they definitely are not immune to potential disasters either.  Just ask them about what happened a few years ago over at Carlos, Texas. 

Anyone heard anything about how The South Texas Project Electric Generating Station at Bay City is faring in this current episode?

Never mind.  I decided to look myself.  It appears that three out of four reactors in the state are running normally.

But like other power plants in Texas of differing fuel types, the South Texas Nuclear Power Station was not built to protect against very cold weather.

“It’s very rare for weather issues to shut down a nuclear plant," said Brett Rampal, director of nuclear innovation at the Clean Air Task Force. "Some equipment in some nuclear plants in Texas has not been hardened for extreme cold weather because there was never a need for this.”

According to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the shutdown of the nuclear reactor was caused by a disruption in a feedwater pump to the reactor, and that caused the plant to trip automatically and shut down early Monday."

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/energy/how-and-why-a-nuclear-reactor-shut-down-in-texas-cold-snap-when-energy-was-needed-most

This ought to be fixed ASAP!

[Bigun]

While there was some problems with our Texas coal generation (frozen instruments, water systems, etc)  It would have helped a lot to have more coal plants, even our Lignite (dirt that burns) plants.

It is frustrating how this week is a duplication of first week in Feb, 2011; but with much bigger numbers.

Report on Outages and Curtailments During the Southwest Cold Weather Event of February 1-5, 2011
https://www.ferc.gov/sites/default/files/2020-04/08-16-11-report.pdf

  

[IsailedawayfromFR]

While there was some problems with our Texas coal generation (frozen instruments, water systems, etc)  It would have helped a lot to have more coal plants, even our Lignite (dirt that burns) plants.

It is frustrating how this week is a duplication of first week in Feb, 2011; but with much bigger numbers.

Report on Outages and Curtailments During the Southwest Cold Weather Event of February 1-5, 2011
https://www.ferc.gov/sites/default/files/2020-04/08-16-11-report.pdf

Texas has far more deposits of coal than of all the rest of the hydrocarbons.

Abundant resources we will never use up.

We certainly do not need to purchase Chinese made wind turbines or solar panels, nor do we need to blend into our gasoline ethanol made elsewhere either.

And plenty of uranium can be mined from the abundant radioactive formations underlying large amounts of acreage within the state to use for our nuclear facilities.

[Bigun]

Texas has far more deposits of coal than of all the rest of the hydrocarbons.

Abundant resources we will never use up.

We certainly do not need to purchase Chinese made wind turbines or solar panels, nor do we need to blend into our gasoline ethanol made elsewhere either.

And plenty of uranium can be mined from the abundant radioactive formations underlying large amounts of acreage within the state to use for our nuclear facilities.

 

[Sled Dog]

4. Huge population growth since last '80's freezes, and infrastructure didn't keep pace

Well, you can't expect all those Californiastan refugees to understand the word "winter".   

And you certainly can't expect them to want to build more fossil fuel power plants to cope with the increased population.

You other states, you really need to implement brains-testing for the California refugees you accept into your states.   Not all of them are human.

[Sled Dog]

I'm not opposed to coal either, especially in areas susceptible to earthquakes, but they definitely are not immune to potential disasters either.  Just ask them about what happened a few years ago over at Carlos, Texas. 

Anyone heard anything about how The South Texas Project Electric Generating Station at Bay City is faring in this current episode?

Never mind.  I decided to look myself.  It appears that three out of four reactors in the state are running normally.

But like other power plants in Texas of differing fuel types, the South Texas Nuclear Power Station was not built to protect against very cold weather.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/energy/how-and-why-a-nuclear-reactor-shut-down-in-texas-cold-snap-when-energy-was-needed-most

This ought to be fixed ASAP!

That's strange.

The feedwater pumps are fed from the turbine condensers by condensate pumps.   None of that part of the system would be affected by outside weather conditions.

Depending on the siting of the plant and it's construction, it's cooling the condensate with natural water sources, or it's running on a cooling tower.   I can't see any kind of problem with a condenser running on natural water sources as the heat sink.   Navy reactors routinely run in the North Atlantic and the sea water temps there can go down to 29 degrees.   It actually boosts the Carnot efficiency of the power plant.

But if they're using a cooling tower...did they forget to put anti-freeze in the circulating water and the pipes froze?   Loss of cooling water would trip the turbines off line and that would dump the feedwater system...

...stupid articles never go into the interesting details.

But...the other half of the reactor system wasn't affected...this might be completely unrelated to the moderate weather they're experiencing.

[thackney]

That's strange.

The feedwater pumps are fed from the turbine condensers by condensate pumps.   None of that part of the system would be affected by outside weather conditions.

Depending on the siting of the plant and it's construction, it's cooling the condensate with natural water sources, or it's running on a cooling tower.   I can't see any kind of problem with a condenser running on natural water sources as the heat sink.   Navy reactors routinely run in the North Atlantic and the sea water temps there can go down to 29 degrees.   It actually boosts the Carnot efficiency of the power plant.

But if they're using a cooling tower...did they forget to put anti-freeze in the circulating water and the pipes froze?   Loss of cooling water would trip the turbines off line and that would dump the feedwater system...

...stupid articles never go into the interesting details.

But...the other half of the reactor system wasn't affected...this might be completely unrelated to the moderate weather they're experiencing.

South Texas Nuclear plant uses a large cooling ponds, not towers.



Power was down for three days.

- - - - - -

“It’s very rare for weather issues to shut down a nuclear plant," said Brett Rampal, director of nuclear innovation at the Clean Air Task Force. "Some equipment in some nuclear plants in Texas has not been hardened for extreme cold weather because there was never a need for this.”

According to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the shutdown of the nuclear reactor was caused by a disruption in a feedwater pump to the reactor, and that caused the plant to trip automatically and shut down early Monday.

There was no underlying danger to the reactor itself, Rampal and other experts said, and the trip was part of normal safety operations protocol.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/energy/how-and-why-a-nuclear-reactor-shut-down-in-texas-cold-snap-when-energy-was-needed-most

- - - - - - -

"At 0526 [CST] on 02/15/2021, Unit 1 automatically tripped due to low steam generator levels. The low steam generator levels were due to loss of Feedwater pumps 11 and 13 (cause unknown).

"Auxiliary Feedwater and Feedwater Isolation actuated as designed. All Control and Shutdown Rods fully inserted. No primary or secondary relief valves opened. There were no electrical problems. Normal operating temperature and pressure (NOT/NOP) is 567 degrees F and 2235 psig.

"There were no significant TS LCOs entered.

"This event was not significant to the health and safety of the public based on all safety systems performed as designed. Unit 2 was not affected. Decay heat removal is being controlled via Steam Dumps. [Auxiliary Feedwater is supplying water to the Steam Generators.] Offsite power is in the normal electrical lineup.

https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/event-status/event/2021/20210216en.html

[Bigun]

The following came to me via an email from an engineer (I've been acquainted with him for many years) with long experience in electrical power generation in Texas. It's a long read but WELL worth your time IMHO.

There are a few narratives floating around about the cause of the electricity shortage in Texas. As an engineer that closely works with Texas energy production and infrastructure, I want to offer my preliminary analysis of the situation we are in. I say preliminary because I know people want answers, but true answers rarely come out as any event is unfolding real time. This is long and will address other narratives at the end.

First and foremost, my heart really breaks for those in dire straights rights now. Rest assured after analyzing the data, I see extra electricity is coming online, and I think this problem is avoidable in the future. It is simply unacceptable for anyone to be without electricity in Texas. Below I will analyze why this happened and some solutions for avoiding this in the future. No politics. No agenda. Just simple answers from an engineer.

Let me start with a graph showing our electricity generation by source in the days leading up to and including the electricity shortage.

You will see on Feb. 4th roughly 20,000 MWh of electricity came from wind and roughly 5,000 MWh from each natural gas, coal, and nuclear. After Feb. 8th, wind produced very little electricity, bottoming out at a negligible number on Feb. 15th when we needed it most. Coal about doubled electricity generation and nuclear stayed about the same. Natural gas on the other hand, went from less than 5,000 MWh to more than 30,000 MWh in this time span. So, natural gas increased 600%, coal increased 100%, nuclear stayed relatively steady and wind tanked almost 97%. Wind, by nature, is fickle. It comes and goes. We cannot control it. With the facts laid out, lets discuss what went wrong.

Wind was a big failure, but that is to be expected. It is an unreliable source of electricity. I will not get into why wind failed. Quite frankly there are many reasons that go outside of my expertise. For whatever reason, wind failed us just when our demand was highest. There should be (and are) plans for what to do when it fails. Our solution when wind fails is to crank up natural gas and to a lesser extent coal. In theory, that is a good plan. However, six coal plants have been shut down over the past three years in Texas. Coal and nuclear are easily the most reliable sources of electricity because coal can be easily stored on site at the power plant and nuclear does not need refueling. Coal plants have been steadily replaced in Texas by wind on the back of federal subsidies and federal regulations to disincentivize coal. The Texas baseline electricity generation went down due to a reliable source being replaced by an unreliable source. In order to counterbalance an increase in unreliable electricity, the market demanded an increase in natural gas based electricity. It was not hurt as heavily as coal by federal regulations. However, natural gas power plants have trouble competing against the heavily subsidized wind rates. Also, the economics don’t work as well when they are only used when wind fails. While wind fails often, there is just no way of predicting it when putting together an economic case for building a natural gas power plant. Even with that being the case, natural gas power plants are still being built trying to catch up with demand due to coal plants shutting down and the highly variable wind power. Compared to three years ago, coal power has been reduced by 37%.

So, what went wrong this week? It was wind failure plus a decimated coal infrastructure. Texas has a natural gas power plant capacity of roughly 34,000 MWh. At its peak on February 15th, natural gas power plants operated at about 125% stated capacity. When ERCOT instituted rolling blackouts on Feb. 15th, natural gas plants immediately reduced electricity generation to a bottom of 80% capacity. Coal also went down to 80% capacity. Wind’s bottom during that period was 3% capacity. The same situation happened in Scotland 10 years ago. Their wind production plummeted to 4% capacity during a blistering cold front, leaving a massive strain on natural gas power plants. Today, natural gas power plants are up at 92% capacity, while coal is still at 80% and wind is limping along at 16% capacity. While we no longer have as much demand for electricity in Texas, it is clear natural gas fared better than any other form of energy and pulled us out of a very difficult situation. The next question is then: why did natural gas power go down to 80% capacity? The natural gas power plants in Texas are incredibly efficient, routinely performing over 100% capacity every summer. This is the first time demand for natural gas spiked so high during an almost uniform freeze across all of Texas. Frozen roads meant trucks could not journey the roads as they normally do to pick up oil from many of the wells across Texas. If the trucks do not pick up the oil, the well gets shut in. If the well gets shut in, natural gas production stops for that well. That happened across New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, and now Louisiana. Therefore, the only gas production supplying the natural gas power plants came from oil wells where the oil had not yet filled the tanks, the oil is not trucked out but rather sent through a pipeline, or brought in from an outside pipeline. This meant gas supply to power plants was constrained.

So, what do we do to prepare for the future? Texas has more wind infrastructure than any other state, at a usable capacity of roughly 21,000 MWh. I have been proud of that fact for a long time. However, we cannot rely on it. Not even at 50%, 20%, or 5% capacity. On a good wind day, we can reduce natural gas consumption if we like, but as we saw this week not even the worst weather event in 100 years can depend on a single MWh of electricity from wind. In the last 3 years Texas has shut down 6,500 MWh of coal power plants, replaced by 2,300 MWh of wind. Texas is scheduled to shut down an additional 5,000 MWh from coal plants. The federal government subsidies for wind amount to 2.3 cents per kWh, putting it well below the cost of coal and natural gas. A free market does not exist between these sources of electricity. As a starter, the coal plants need to remain. They are too reliable to discard. Additionally, Texas needs to increase the baseload electricity, that is the nuclear, coal, natural gas mix that is always functional. Federal wind subsidies need to be counter balanced in Texas in some way to make a fair market for natural gas to compete. Perhaps the state should tax the wind farms at the same rate the federal subsidies are set. Or subsidize natural gas by guaranteeing a certain fraction of the baseload for natural gas. It doesn’t really matter, but the market needs to be balanced. Fourth, we need to address the natural gas supply to the power plants. Natural gas storage may be a solution. Storing gas is difficult, but doable. A strategic reserve would be useful. Or perhaps requiring oil production facilities that also feed natural gas to a pipeline to maintain oil storage capacity of one week or more. One other idea is to lay more oil and natural gas pipelines. Underground pipelines are much less likely to freeze and are much more reliable than trucks. Last, Texas needs more natural gas, coal, or nuclear power facilities. Demand is increasing with more residents flocking to the state and wind is too unreliable to count on satisfying the demand. Unfortunately, we have let it become too high of a percent of our power in Texas. Just as Scotland learned in 2010, wind was not there when it was needed most. Sadly, we learned that lesson the hard way. Texas cannot allow politics to outweigh the science. We cannot shut down 11,500 MWh of reliable electricity and think wind will always be there to balance it out. Sometimes it will be able to, but not always.

To address some other narratives floating around:

Natural Gas was the Failure: This narrative relies on quotes from a few people in high places trying save their skin. The data does not support it. Right before ERCOT instituted the blackouts, natural gas power plants were operating over 100% of their design capacity. ERCOT artificially constrained demand with the blackouts. Only after that did the natural gas power plants move to 80% capacity. There is some truth to natural gas supply to the power plants going down due to logistical constraints with the freezing weather (addressed above). Perhaps ERCOT was anticipating reduced generation from these plants, but that remains to be seen.

Wind Actually Produced More than Projected: At times this is true. However, at the most critical time wind only produced 650 MWh and averaged under its projection for the blackout days. Remember, wind produces what can. It is not limited artificially like natural gas is. Natural gas fills what wind is not able to produce, whatever that needs to be. However, the ERCOT projection was off by about 10,000 MWh for consumer demand. No matter the projections, Texas did not stand a chance with wind, an average of 20% of Texas electrical generation, operating at just 3% capacity.

The Texas Grid is an Island, not Connected with Other Grids: This is not true. Texas has agreements to sell to or purchase electricity from two neighboring grids. Texas had been a net exporter to the two grids for many years until mid 2018, the year Texas shut down several coal power plants. Now Texas is a net importer of electricity. However, those two grids also experienced the same weather as Texas and cut off their electricity supply to Texas to service their own demand (as they should).

One final thought:

ERCOT underestimated demand by more than 10,000 MWh. This was likely a higher demand than Texas had ever seen, even during the heat of the summer. The only way it could have worked is if everything we had was firing on all cylinders. With two natural gas power plants down for routine maintenance, natural gas supply issues, reduction in coal capacity, and fickle wind, it is unlikely there would be a case we could avoid blackouts without a baseline increase to natural gas, coal, or nuclear power generation. Don’t read this as a case against wind as much as a case for more reliable power generation. If Texas still had the 6,500 MWh of coal power it shut down, I bet the blackouts would have been delayed, shortened, or even avoided. There is no way to know for sure, but I know all of us that had no power would have loved those six power plants that were shut down over the past three years to be running this week.

[libertybele]

The following came to me via an email from an engineer (I've been acquainted with him for many years) with long experience in electrical power generation in Texas. It's a long read but WELL worth your time IMHO.

   

Good post.  Thank you.           

[Bigun]

   

Good post.  Thank you.         

You are most welcome!

And BTW, This little excerpt is at the root of the problem and is no accident!

The federal government subsidies for wind amount to 2.3 cents per kWh, putting it well below the cost of coal and natural gas. A free market does not exist between these sources of electricity.

[thackney]

The following came to me via an email from an engineer (I've been acquainted with him for many years) with long experience in electrical power generation in Texas. It's a long read but WELL worth your time IMHO.

Capacity is measured in MW, not MWH.  If just a typo, the numbers don't make sense. 

[Bigun]

Capacity is measured in MW, not MWH.  If just a typo, the numbers don't make sense.

I posted it just as I got it and the only numbers in it that I really give a damn about are these:

The federal government subsidies for wind amount to 2.3 cents per kWh, putting it well below the cost of coal and natural gas. A free market does not exist between these sources of electricity. because they go right to the heart of the problem IMHO.

The federal government is actively doing its best to undermine the idea of a market based electrical grid in Texas.