Fixing Texas' unreliable power grid won't be cheap or easy. Can we trust politicians to get it done?
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/investigations/article/failures-of-power-texas-grid-ercot-problem-fix-16191651.phpMay 25, 2021
...It’s a problem that will be neither cheap nor easy to fix. At the most fundamental level, experts say, avoiding another grid disaster will require the rethinking of a market-driven system that favors efficiency — and the resulting lower prices — over reliability, which requires backup generation and redundant systems that can add significant costs, even if they are rarely used.
What worries insiders such as Snyder is politicians are looking for simple fixes, a checklist of solutions to protect against a repeat of February’s frigid weather, as opposed to creating a more resilient system capable of handling extreme weather yet to be anticipated.
“I’m getting a lot of calls from legislators, and frankly the people who are going to be voting on this understand the problem just enough to be really freaking dangerous,” Snyder said in March. “I don’t know how this is going to come out.”
The Texas Legislature is moving to require power generators, natural gas operators and pipeline companies to better weatherize their systems, as well as revamp the organizations that oversee the grid and power system, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT, and the Public Utility Commission. But these measures do little to induce power companies to have sufficient generation ready for unusual weather that drives electricity demand far beyond what was forecast, experts say....
