35 ms·

The Texas electric grid can barely keep the lights on

118 points by sh1mmer 4y ago

pedro2 4y ago
So has Musk changes the Tesla factory to Texas yet? Serious question.
- CamperBob2 4y ago
  Yes, and Samsung has also announced a new $17B fab project near Austin. It's like these people either know something we don't, or they're forehead-slapping dumbasses who've accidentally stumbled into billions of dollars, over and over. I don't know which to believe.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    If someone can handle fluctuations in power it’s probably Tesla and a giant line of power walls. Maybe they can even strike deals to go off grid when paid to do so.
    - notabee 4y ago
      They've already embarked on making one of those huge grid-balancing battery facilities here and I'm sure more will follow. Likely they're waiting for the inevitable Texas grid fuckup that's even worse than 2021 to happen so they can come bail it out and make some real infrastructure money. If they have to do some idiotic libertarian song and dance to ingratiate themselves with the all-hat-no-cattle corrupt knuckle-draggers that run this state to pull it off, they'll probably do that too.
josephcsible 4y ago
> change your thermostat setting to 78° Yeah, I can't take this guy seriously.
- h2odragon 4y ago
  I just turned my heater off now that temps are staying reliably above 72F. I wont turn air conditioning on until mid 90s, and then it gets set to 89F or so. As far as I can see, the rest of the world isn't furry enough to live the way they do. Humans are far too fond of their clothes.
- mh- 4y ago
  And if you take his claims about covid obscuring the growth in demand at face value, you'll just be exacerbating the problem by not using energy "normally". But you'll be a soupy mess while you do it. I can't imagine not running AC, if only for its dehumidifying effects, in a Houston summer.
  - jona-f 4y ago
    I'm pretty sure you're bullshitting yourself there. "exacerbating the problem", when not turning on the ac? I don't blame you for wanting a nice livable climate, but don't make up reasons that using the energy is better for everyone.
    - mh- 4y ago
      I thought it was pretty clear that was not a justification. It was more of an eye-roll at the idea that covid made demand impossible to understand.
      - jona-f 4y ago
        Oh yeah, sorry, i misunderstood.
- vba616 4y ago
  That is the official advice from "Brad Jones, CEO of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas". What's unserious about it? Reportedly, six power plants were offline, accounting for "roughly 2,900 megawatts of electricity — or enough to power nearly 600,000 homes". Massive demand combined with substantial supply reduction is generally bad news.
wmf 4y ago
ERCOT has a pretty readable dashboard at https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards where you can watch the situation in real time.
- JeanMeche 4y ago
  I'm getting an Access Denied. Am I the only one ? (Living in France fwiw)
  - bschne 4y ago
    Same from Switzerland
  - bee_rider 4y ago
    I didn't get Access Denied, in the US. I wonder if they only serve to the US. Weird, although I guess it must be pretty unusual that people in France care about the ERCOT status.
    - timbit42 4y ago
      I didn't get access denied from Canada.
    - dEnigma 4y ago
      It even says: "If you believe you have a valid business reason for accessing ERCOT resources, please contact the ERCOT ServiceDesk at ServiceDesk@ercot.com"
      - Hamuko 4y ago
        Do you think they'd approve me if I said I wanted to make fun of them on Twitter in case their grid fails again?
        BenjiWiebe 4y ago
        Try it and see. Maybe!
mwattsun 4y ago
Interesting: I assumed Texas wasn't connected to the national grid because they hate the Federal govt (I remember Texas' Rick Perry saying he wanted to abolish the Dept of Energy.) But Michael Lee says it's because they can move faster in building transmission lines for wind energy. No idea if this is true.
- captn3m0 4y ago
  Wikipedia cites https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2003/08/why-texas-has-its-own-power-grid.html https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2003/08/why-texas-has-it... and says it’s political.
  - frankfrankfrank 4y ago
    You are citing wikipedia that cites slate ... not exactly good faith, authoritative sources. It is not "political" as the context of your reply clearly indicates as much as it is deeply tied to not only the history of Texas as it relates to joining the USA and also the fundamental manner in which the USA was supposed to function, wich has been and continues to be under constant and direct assault. It may ruffle your feathers, but not knowing these things clearly indicates that you are not American, however the real questions should be "why is not every other sovereign state of the United States acting more like Texas and why is the system so broken today that essentially only Texas acts the way the system intended states to act?". The only other state that comes close to Texas, may be Florida, which is emerging and moving in that direction, at least among the states of consequence.
    - quintushoratius 4y ago
      > It is not "political" as the context of your reply clearly indicates as much as it is deeply tied to not only the history of Texas as it relates to joining the USA and also the fundamental manner in which the USA was supposed to function, wich has been and continues to be under constant and direct assault. So... not technical, but political
      - 4y ago
bink 4y ago
He talks about several generation facilities catching fire and going out of service in recent days, but focuses primarily on the causes of the energy shortage being regulation and bureaucracy taking too long to approve new generation rather than lack of regulation preventing these fires. Then he talks about how Texas actually approves new generation faster than other states. It seems like an argument made to support a predetermined opinion. The mention of quick approval of transmission lines is interesting, but I do have to wonder how those that live near these new lines feel about quick approvals. I worked in the industry for several years so I'm not at all suggesting all regulations are good. And I realize how hard it can be to get approval to run a new transmission line or pipeline is most of the country. But that doesn't mean the answer to every energy shortage is just to loosen regulations and build more of everything.
- xoa 4y ago
  >He talks about several generation facilities catching fire and going out of service in recent days, but focuses primarily on the causes of the energy shortage being regulation and bureaucracy taking too long to approve new generation rather than lack of regulation preventing these fires. Then he talks about how Texas actually approves new generation faster than other states. It seems like an argument made to support a predetermined opinion. Huh? That was only mentioned to point out that the classic "renewables are so risky" line hasn't borne out for Texas. Fossil fuel plants have repeatedly been an issue as well. But it was just an aside, more importantly was it saying those generation facilities all being online wouldn't actually make much difference. That power generation will sometimes need maintenance or have failures or under production at awkward times is just the nature of the beast, certain safety regulation might help but everyone on HN should have some sense that chasing 9s gets very expensive very fast. What's really needed is to just have enough overall capacity (both steady and peaker) ready that a reasonable amount of failure is always ok. In a large energy grid a few generators dropping should never register as an immediate possible emergency. Texas needs more generation/storage approved faster. And other states are tied into vastly more massive grids, they aren't islands, and they haven't had the same obvious increasing demand due to demographic/business shifts that Texas has been very actively encouraging. Their connections lets them help cover each other, which is a perfectly valid strategy, and they will have a more gradual increase. That other states are slightly worse than Texas isn't presented as an OK thing, but rather something they should be working on too. But they have less immediate need. That's just how it is. I'm not sure how you came to your conclusion there. I don't know if he's right, I'm not from there, but his message is self-consistent.
hk1337 4y ago
Wind generation is plays a role in the Texas grid and we’ve had a lot days without wind. Wind, you know a renewable energy source everyone wants instead of fossil fuels. EDIT: Also, I hate this new “blogging format” of multiple tweets instead of a single page.
- seventytwo 4y ago
  Oh stop with the anti-wind propaganda. It’s no truer now than it was last time.
  - cpurdy 4y ago
    Please, can't you just think of all of the children dying from windmill cancer?
    - pfdietz 4y ago
      There has never been a single recorded case of someone surviving windmill cancer. Scary!
- mhoad 4y ago
  Weren’t all of the sites offline gas?
weezin 4y ago
Texas has been near 100 on multiple days already.
- doodlebugging 4y ago
  A large part of Texas has already been over 100°. Generally west of Hwy 281 towards Odessa and north to the Red River has seen hotter days overall than most of the rest of the state.
  - weezin 4y ago
    True it depends where you are. Saying "its not even hot yet" is pretty ridiculous.
    - doodlebugging 4y ago
      Yeah. Texas is big enough that the western half of the state can be in extreme drought while the eastern half sees record rainfall and everything is green.
    - stjohnswarts 4y ago
      100 in Texas is hot no matter what time of year it is, despite the claims, especially in the more humid parts of the state :)
txcwpalpha 4y ago
"it's not even hot yet" what? May 2022 is on track to be the hottest May on record in Texas. It's already hitting over 100 degrees in most of Texas. It does not typically get this hot until July. Most of the country is facing a huge heat wave this last week, and while some of the country got a reprieve this weekend, Texas did not. For comparison, this time last year the temperature was in the 70s/low 80s. The average high for May in Austin is 86. The temperature this week in Austin is forecast to be over 100. It's ridiculous that the Texas grid can't handle this, but to say "it's not even hot yet" is disingenuous. It's fucking hot. https://news.yahoo.com/texas-shatters-heat-record-temps-180534061.html https://news.yahoo.com/texas-shatters-heat-record-temps-1805... https://weather.com/forecast/regional/news/2022-05-06-heat-wave-spring-records-south-midwest https://weather.com/forecast/regional/news/2022-05-06-heat-w... https://www.kvue.com/article/weather/may-2022-track-to-be-warmest-on-record-austin/269-c2988454-a43a-48ad-9220-231c86ab40af https://www.kvue.com/article/weather/may-2022-track-to-be-wa...
- psbp 4y ago
  July and August are much hotter. The suggestion is that if the Texas grid cannot handle unseasonable weather by a month or two, we are in a very dangerous situation going forward. Especially since unexpected weather seems to be increasingly common.
- kardianos 4y ago
  Texas power is doing just fine.
  - CamperBob2 4y ago
    Well, evidence from the recent past suggests otherwise, and we're being told differently now. Got any specific points to make?
    - kardianos 4y ago
      I'm in Texas and my servers and lights are on without interruption. As far as I'm concerned, the grid has not failed.
DoreenMichele 4y ago
Just to try to make this point front and center, he says a few tweets in: But we’re an electrical island. We’re not connected to other grids. This independence allows us to do things like build CREZ (transmission lines for wind energy) quickly and without FERC bureaucracy. But it comes with a risk: we always have to supply all of our own energy. This is a large part of why Texas is having electrical issues making national headlines and I'm not sure it's really getting the emphasis it merits to understand the issue.
- nradov 4y ago
  What he stated isn't completely accurate. The Texas grid is not an island. It is connected to both the Eastern US grid and the Mexico grid, although the ties are relatively low capacity and sometimes not used. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Interconnection https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Interconnection
- Element_ 4y ago
  My understanding from reading about the TX power grid during the last Texas energy crisis is that even if it was interconnected to other states the interconnections wouldn't have been large enough to make a difference during a significant failure like the last one. Not sure about this most recent issue.
  - txcwpalpha 4y ago
    This gets overlooked a lot in the outrage porn of "Texas bad". Every single adjacent grid to Texas was also suffering from rolling or consistent blackouts during last year's February winter storm. Oklahoma had blackouts, Arkansas had blackouts, Missouri had blackouts, Louisiana had blackouts. https://kansasreflector.com/2021/07/26/fuel-shortages-drove-february-blackouts-southwest-power-pool-investigators-find/ https://kansasreflector.com/2021/07/26/fuel-shortages-drove-... The blackouts were not as bad as Texas and had they been on the same grid, it may have been able to spread (and lessen) the pain a little bit, but the point stands that Texas' neighbors did not have much electricity to spare. This month is a little different because other states do have spare electricity AFAIK, but the links Texas has to those grids have relatively low capacity to share it.
bloomingeek 4y ago
Not to get anybodies goat, but living in larger homes with above normal HVAC systems is very expensive. Insulating homes has come a long way in the past few decades, but size is what matters. Energy companies are always going to look for ways to make money, why would we help them by using large amounts of electricity? I live in a hot state, Oklahoma, the best I ever did was upgrade my A/C to a R-410a system. This was 11 years ago and it has more then paid for itself. (My old R-22 system was well maintained) We can't rely on the energy companies to do anything cost saving for us, we must do it.
- paulmd 4y ago
  My understanding is also that homes in Texas generally also have substandard insulation because they come from an era where it was feasible to just open a window and get a breeze going. This came into play a year and a half ago when we had severe cold, one of the exacerbating factors was - those homes weren't well-insulated, so they had to use way more energy for heat than a properly-insulated home would have. Texas is basically a fractal of aggressive and deliberate fuckups all the way down, because ain't no ivory-tower elitist going to tell ME how to build my house/grid/power plant!
  - _ajoj 4y ago
    > My understanding is also that homes in Texas generally also have substandard insulation because they come from an era where it was feasible to just open a window and get a breeze going. Uhh no. It's because it is cheaper. Especially homes built in the last five years seem to be lacking on insulation. > Texas is basically a fractal of aggressive and deliberate fuckups all the way down, because ain't no ivory-tower elitist going to tell ME how to build my house/grid/power plant! Yes. Please don't move here and tell all your friends not to move here.
- pstuart 4y ago
  Providing zero-interest loans to improve efficiency and reduce demand (e.g., rooftop solar) seems like a net win: homeowners can lower their operating costs and utilities can minimize peak demand.
asciimov 4y ago
Life long Texan here. Some of y'all need to get this setting your house temp to 78° figured out. 78 is damned comfortable, even in high humidity, as long as you have your ceiling fans on moving that air around. Don't have ceiling fans? Better get them installed in every room. Lowes and Home Depot regularly sell ceiling fans that are $35 that are quiet and run just fine. Sure 78 isn't as cold as 72 or 68 that many of y'all like keeping your houses in the summer, but it sure as hell beats the indoor temps of 95+ when you don't have power.
- BenjiWiebe 4y ago
  Kansan here, agreed. My family likes to keep the temperature in the house around 70... To me that's even a bit cold. And that's without ceiling fans (nearly no moving air).
- sgt 4y ago
  Is it common for people in TX to run their AC's all day?
  - finiteseries 4y ago
    It’s very common throughout hot & humid climates in the US to leave the central air conditioner maintaining set temperatures all day. How often it’s actually blowing cool dry air out of all the vents depends on the unit/weather/setting/insulation etc.
    - chrisdhoover 4y ago
      With the thermostat set at 78. The air cycles on at about 2 in the afternoon. At about 6 it stops. The out side temperature has been dropping from the 90s to the 70’s overnight
  - stjohnswarts 4y ago
    the thermostat will dictate if that's necessary. Modern homes tend to have really good insulation. Older homes though can be horrible at efficiency but most people will get after market spray foams in their walls because it's pretty cheap compared to year after year AC bills of $400
chroem- 4y ago
Is California still experiencing rolling brownouts?
- nradov 4y ago
  California last had large scale rolling blackouts (load shedding) during the 2020 summer heat wave. There's a good chance of similar problems this summer since we haven't done much to improve the system. https://www.powergrid.news/2020-08-19-blackouts-demonstrate-green-power-grid-failure.html https://www.powergrid.news/2020-08-19-blackouts-demonstrate-...
walnutclosefarm 4y ago
I know I'm a cranky old man, but who publishes essay-length analyses via twitter? Just. Dumb.
- paulmd 4y ago
  Sadly, nobody is going to pay attention to an essay in a journal or an opinion piece in a newspaper. Twitter gets attention. This is probably especially true in Texas where one of the defining characteristics of the controlling party of the one-party state (thanks to intense gerrymandering) is anti-intellectualism. They not only won't listen to "liberal academics" or opinion pieces in "liberal newspapers", they'll actively oppose whatever they say on the simple basis of who said it.
  - meatsauce 4y ago
    To be fair, most of what comes out of a liberal's mouth is usually emotionally charged narrative-craft, and has no bearing on practical reality, and therefore can be safely ignored.
newaccount2021 4y ago
gzer0 4y ago
And this is precisely why I decided to bite the bullet and install solar + 2 Powerwall batteries for backup. No longer need to worry about the clowns in office since clearly they have not learned from the February 2021 debacle.
- stjohnswarts 4y ago
  How much was that? about $40k?
  - gzer0 4y ago
    * 4.80 kW Solar Panels -- +$12,576 * 2 Powerwall Batteries -- +$18,500 * Cash Price -- +$31,076 * Federal Tax Credit -$8,080 * --------------------- * Net Price: $22,996 Tesla Solar (yes, cheaper options exist. Tesla solar was the best for me and the least hassle, AIO solution). I know this sounds like a bizarre setup (4.80 kW?) but my main goal was to be able to have two Powerwall backups that I would have incase the grid fails me. I charge the Powerwalls at night during offpeak hours for free and keep them near 100%. 29% of my energy needs are offset with the 4.80kW panels. I plan to add more powerful solar panels soon. 9.6kW panels would allow me to offset 58% of my energy needs; it would add on $12k to my costs, but I am safe knowing that I don't need to completely rely on ERCOT and their mafia anymore (to an extent). TL;DR $23k USD. I was able to get a 0% APR loan as well, so I'm paying around $130 / month. After including the energy generated/offset, it goes to net ~$93 month.
    - Ekaros 4y ago
      Wait how is electricity free during night? Is there so much wind that it is free already?
      - gzer0 4y ago
        Nights Free Plan - Use most of your electricity from 9 pm to 7 am every day to take advantage of this plan. [1] https://justenergy.com/get-offer/free-nights-or-weekends-electricity-plan/ https://justenergy.com/get-offer/free-nights-or-weekends-ele...
csours 4y ago
People who get really mad at ERCOT, please also look into the roles that the Public Utility Commission and the Railroad Commission play in the Texas energy market. ERCOT has some responsibility, but it seems to me that they are mainly the scapegoat.
- stjohnswarts 4y ago
  It really isn't ERCOT, it's the Texas government that is the problem. ERCOT has -very- limited power over things. They have very limited power over the power providers in the state.
tekstar 4y ago
When I learnt about how the Texas grid was a disconnected electrical island I thought maybe there is now a market to charge transport-trailer sized batteries out of state, drive them into Texas and drain them into the grid.
- wmf 4y ago
  Or just leave the batteries permanently installed in Texas, charge them overnight, and discharge them during the day. https://electrek.co/2022/01/06/tesla-unveils-giant-megapack-battery-project-texas/ https://electrek.co/2022/01/06/tesla-unveils-giant-megapack-... The price of electricity was near zero from 2-4 AM last night.
- stjohnswarts 4y ago
  Texas grid is big enough to do fine on it's own. The problem is that power providers (and gas companies) are given the upper hand and never had to winterize more than a token amount, hence the house of cards came down last February and around 500 people died as a result. The Texas lege passed an "oops" bill that put on a couple bandaids, but the same thing is bound to happen again with the next big Freeze comes along.
kardianos 4y ago
I don't see sources. ERCOT's sites show plenty of reserve. I've not experienced any power issues. It sounds like someone is not telling the truth.
- WalterGR 4y ago
  > I've not experienced any power issues. Your personal experience doesn't appear to be universal. There's plenty of news coverage about six power plants going offline because of high usage: https://www.google.com/search?q=ercot+six https://www.google.com/search?q=ercot+six > It sounds like someone is not telling the truth. Are you sure you're not from Missouri? (The "Show Me" state. Ba dum tish.)
  - kardianos 4y ago
    Power plants come on and go off all the time. That's a far cry from grid failure.
BonoboIO 4y ago
Lyrics of the Official state song: „ Texas, Our Texas! All hail the mighty State! Texas, Our Texas! So wonderful, so great! Boldest and grandest, withstanding ev'ry test O Empire wide and glorious, you stand supremely blest.“ What a Match
bediger4000 4y ago
That's good! Market forces at work mean that production almost exactly meets demand.
windows2020 4y ago
Nice try, Federal Government.
sylware 4y ago
could we get a nitter link with those kind of twitter "news", that to work with noscript/basic (x)html browsers out-of-the-box.

118 points by sh1mmer 4y ago

pedro2 4y ago

So has Musk changes the Tesla factory to Texas yet? Serious question.

CamperBob2 4y ago
Yes, and Samsung has also announced a new $17B fab project near Austin. It's like these people either know something we don't, or they're forehead-slapping dumbasses who've accidentally stumbled into billions of dollars, over and over. I don't know which to believe.
- bombcar 4y ago
  If someone can handle fluctuations in power it’s probably Tesla and a giant line of power walls. Maybe they can even strike deals to go off grid when paid to do so.
  - notabee 4y ago
    They've already embarked on making one of those huge grid-balancing battery facilities here and I'm sure more will follow. Likely they're waiting for the inevitable Texas grid fuckup that's even worse than 2021 to happen so they can come bail it out and make some real infrastructure money. If they have to do some idiotic libertarian song and dance to ingratiate themselves with the all-hat-no-cattle corrupt knuckle-draggers that run this state to pull it off, they'll probably do that too.

josephcsible 4y ago

> change your thermostat setting to 78° Yeah, I can't take this guy seriously.

h2odragon 4y ago
I just turned my heater off now that temps are staying reliably above 72F. I wont turn air conditioning on until mid 90s, and then it gets set to 89F or so. As far as I can see, the rest of the world isn't furry enough to live the way they do. Humans are far too fond of their clothes.
mh- 4y ago
And if you take his claims about covid obscuring the growth in demand at face value, you'll just be exacerbating the problem by not using energy "normally". But you'll be a soupy mess while you do it. I can't imagine not running AC, if only for its dehumidifying effects, in a Houston summer.
- jona-f 4y ago
  I'm pretty sure you're bullshitting yourself there. "exacerbating the problem", when not turning on the ac? I don't blame you for wanting a nice livable climate, but don't make up reasons that using the energy is better for everyone.
  - mh- 4y ago
    I thought it was pretty clear that was not a justification. It was more of an eye-roll at the idea that covid made demand impossible to understand.
    - jona-f 4y ago
      Oh yeah, sorry, i misunderstood.
vba616 4y ago
That is the official advice from "Brad Jones, CEO of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas". What's unserious about it? Reportedly, six power plants were offline, accounting for "roughly 2,900 megawatts of electricity — or enough to power nearly 600,000 homes". Massive demand combined with substantial supply reduction is generally bad news.

wmf 4y ago

ERCOT has a pretty readable dashboard at https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards https://www.ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards where you can watch the situation in real time.

JeanMeche 4y ago
I'm getting an Access Denied. Am I the only one ? (Living in France fwiw)
- bschne 4y ago
  Same from Switzerland
- bee_rider 4y ago
  I didn't get Access Denied, in the US. I wonder if they only serve to the US. Weird, although I guess it must be pretty unusual that people in France care about the ERCOT status.
  - timbit42 4y ago
    I didn't get access denied from Canada.
  - dEnigma 4y ago
    It even says: "If you believe you have a valid business reason for accessing ERCOT resources, please contact the ERCOT ServiceDesk at ServiceDesk@ercot.com"
    - Hamuko 4y ago
      Do you think they'd approve me if I said I wanted to make fun of them on Twitter in case their grid fails again?
      - BenjiWiebe 4y ago
        Try it and see. Maybe!

mwattsun 4y ago

Interesting: I assumed Texas wasn't connected to the national grid because they hate the Federal govt (I remember Texas' Rick Perry saying he wanted to abolish the Dept of Energy.) But Michael Lee says it's because they can move faster in building transmission lines for wind energy. No idea if this is true.

captn3m0 4y ago
Wikipedia cites https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2003/08/why-texas-has-its-own-power-grid.html https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2003/08/why-texas-has-it... and says it’s political.
- frankfrankfrank 4y ago
  You are citing wikipedia that cites slate ... not exactly good faith, authoritative sources. It is not "political" as the context of your reply clearly indicates as much as it is deeply tied to not only the history of Texas as it relates to joining the USA and also the fundamental manner in which the USA was supposed to function, wich has been and continues to be under constant and direct assault. It may ruffle your feathers, but not knowing these things clearly indicates that you are not American, however the real questions should be "why is not every other sovereign state of the United States acting more like Texas and why is the system so broken today that essentially only Texas acts the way the system intended states to act?". The only other state that comes close to Texas, may be Florida, which is emerging and moving in that direction, at least among the states of consequence.
  - quintushoratius 4y ago
    > It is not "political" as the context of your reply clearly indicates as much as it is deeply tied to not only the history of Texas as it relates to joining the USA and also the fundamental manner in which the USA was supposed to function, wich has been and continues to be under constant and direct assault. So... not technical, but political
    - 4y ago

bink 4y ago

He talks about several generation facilities catching fire and going out of service in recent days, but focuses primarily on the causes of the energy shortage being regulation and bureaucracy taking too long to approve new generation rather than lack of regulation preventing these fires. Then he talks about how Texas actually approves new generation faster than other states. It seems like an argument made to support a predetermined opinion. The mention of quick approval of transmission lines is interesting, but I do have to wonder how those that live near these new lines feel about quick approvals. I worked in the industry for several years so I'm not at all suggesting all regulations are good. And I realize how hard it can be to get approval to run a new transmission line or pipeline is most of the country. But that doesn't mean the answer to every energy shortage is just to loosen regulations and build more of everything.

xoa 4y ago
>He talks about several generation facilities catching fire and going out of service in recent days, but focuses primarily on the causes of the energy shortage being regulation and bureaucracy taking too long to approve new generation rather than lack of regulation preventing these fires. Then he talks about how Texas actually approves new generation faster than other states. It seems like an argument made to support a predetermined opinion. Huh? That was only mentioned to point out that the classic "renewables are so risky" line hasn't borne out for Texas. Fossil fuel plants have repeatedly been an issue as well. But it was just an aside, more importantly was it saying those generation facilities all being online wouldn't actually make much difference. That power generation will sometimes need maintenance or have failures or under production at awkward times is just the nature of the beast, certain safety regulation might help but everyone on HN should have some sense that chasing 9s gets very expensive very fast. What's really needed is to just have enough overall capacity (both steady and peaker) ready that a reasonable amount of failure is always ok. In a large energy grid a few generators dropping should never register as an immediate possible emergency. Texas needs more generation/storage approved faster. And other states are tied into vastly more massive grids, they aren't islands, and they haven't had the same obvious increasing demand due to demographic/business shifts that Texas has been very actively encouraging. Their connections lets them help cover each other, which is a perfectly valid strategy, and they will have a more gradual increase. That other states are slightly worse than Texas isn't presented as an OK thing, but rather something they should be working on too. But they have less immediate need. That's just how it is. I'm not sure how you came to your conclusion there. I don't know if he's right, I'm not from there, but his message is self-consistent.

hk1337 4y ago

Wind generation is plays a role in the Texas grid and we’ve had a lot days without wind. Wind, you know a renewable energy source everyone wants instead of fossil fuels. EDIT: Also, I hate this new “blogging format” of multiple tweets instead of a single page.

seventytwo 4y ago
Oh stop with the anti-wind propaganda. It’s no truer now than it was last time.
- cpurdy 4y ago
  Please, can't you just think of all of the children dying from windmill cancer?
  - pfdietz 4y ago
    There has never been a single recorded case of someone surviving windmill cancer. Scary!
mhoad 4y ago
Weren’t all of the sites offline gas?

weezin 4y ago

Texas has been near 100 on multiple days already.

doodlebugging 4y ago
A large part of Texas has already been over 100°. Generally west of Hwy 281 towards Odessa and north to the Red River has seen hotter days overall than most of the rest of the state.
- weezin 4y ago
  True it depends where you are. Saying "its not even hot yet" is pretty ridiculous.
  - doodlebugging 4y ago
    Yeah. Texas is big enough that the western half of the state can be in extreme drought while the eastern half sees record rainfall and everything is green.
  - stjohnswarts 4y ago
    100 in Texas is hot no matter what time of year it is, despite the claims, especially in the more humid parts of the state :)

txcwpalpha 4y ago

"it's not even hot yet" what? May 2022 is on track to be the hottest May on record in Texas. It's already hitting over 100 degrees in most of Texas. It does not typically get this hot until July. Most of the country is facing a huge heat wave this last week, and while some of the country got a reprieve this weekend, Texas did not. For comparison, this time last year the temperature was in the 70s/low 80s. The average high for May in Austin is 86. The temperature this week in Austin is forecast to be over 100. It's ridiculous that the Texas grid can't handle this, but to say "it's not even hot yet" is disingenuous. It's fucking hot. https://news.yahoo.com/texas-shatters-heat-record-temps-180534061.html https://news.yahoo.com/texas-shatters-heat-record-temps-1805... https://weather.com/forecast/regional/news/2022-05-06-heat-wave-spring-records-south-midwest https://weather.com/forecast/regional/news/2022-05-06-heat-w... https://www.kvue.com/article/weather/may-2022-track-to-be-warmest-on-record-austin/269-c2988454-a43a-48ad-9220-231c86ab40af https://www.kvue.com/article/weather/may-2022-track-to-be-wa...

psbp 4y ago
July and August are much hotter. The suggestion is that if the Texas grid cannot handle unseasonable weather by a month or two, we are in a very dangerous situation going forward. Especially since unexpected weather seems to be increasingly common.
kardianos 4y ago
Texas power is doing just fine.
- CamperBob2 4y ago
  Well, evidence from the recent past suggests otherwise, and we're being told differently now. Got any specific points to make?
  - kardianos 4y ago
    I'm in Texas and my servers and lights are on without interruption. As far as I'm concerned, the grid has not failed.

DoreenMichele 4y ago

Just to try to make this point front and center, he says a few tweets in: But we’re an electrical island. We’re not connected to other grids. This independence allows us to do things like build CREZ (transmission lines for wind energy) quickly and without FERC bureaucracy. But it comes with a risk: we always have to supply all of our own energy. This is a large part of why Texas is having electrical issues making national headlines and I'm not sure it's really getting the emphasis it merits to understand the issue.

nradov 4y ago
What he stated isn't completely accurate. The Texas grid is not an island. It is connected to both the Eastern US grid and the Mexico grid, although the ties are relatively low capacity and sometimes not used. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Interconnection https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Interconnection
Element_ 4y ago
My understanding from reading about the TX power grid during the last Texas energy crisis is that even if it was interconnected to other states the interconnections wouldn't have been large enough to make a difference during a significant failure like the last one. Not sure about this most recent issue.
- txcwpalpha 4y ago
  This gets overlooked a lot in the outrage porn of "Texas bad". Every single adjacent grid to Texas was also suffering from rolling or consistent blackouts during last year's February winter storm. Oklahoma had blackouts, Arkansas had blackouts, Missouri had blackouts, Louisiana had blackouts. https://kansasreflector.com/2021/07/26/fuel-shortages-drove-february-blackouts-southwest-power-pool-investigators-find/ https://kansasreflector.com/2021/07/26/fuel-shortages-drove-... The blackouts were not as bad as Texas and had they been on the same grid, it may have been able to spread (and lessen) the pain a little bit, but the point stands that Texas' neighbors did not have much electricity to spare. This month is a little different because other states do have spare electricity AFAIK, but the links Texas has to those grids have relatively low capacity to share it.

bloomingeek 4y ago

Not to get anybodies goat, but living in larger homes with above normal HVAC systems is very expensive. Insulating homes has come a long way in the past few decades, but size is what matters. Energy companies are always going to look for ways to make money, why would we help them by using large amounts of electricity? I live in a hot state, Oklahoma, the best I ever did was upgrade my A/C to a R-410a system. This was 11 years ago and it has more then paid for itself. (My old R-22 system was well maintained) We can't rely on the energy companies to do anything cost saving for us, we must do it.

paulmd 4y ago
My understanding is also that homes in Texas generally also have substandard insulation because they come from an era where it was feasible to just open a window and get a breeze going. This came into play a year and a half ago when we had severe cold, one of the exacerbating factors was - those homes weren't well-insulated, so they had to use way more energy for heat than a properly-insulated home would have. Texas is basically a fractal of aggressive and deliberate fuckups all the way down, because ain't no ivory-tower elitist going to tell ME how to build my house/grid/power plant!
- _ajoj 4y ago
  > My understanding is also that homes in Texas generally also have substandard insulation because they come from an era where it was feasible to just open a window and get a breeze going. Uhh no. It's because it is cheaper. Especially homes built in the last five years seem to be lacking on insulation. > Texas is basically a fractal of aggressive and deliberate fuckups all the way down, because ain't no ivory-tower elitist going to tell ME how to build my house/grid/power plant! Yes. Please don't move here and tell all your friends not to move here.
pstuart 4y ago
Providing zero-interest loans to improve efficiency and reduce demand (e.g., rooftop solar) seems like a net win: homeowners can lower their operating costs and utilities can minimize peak demand.

asciimov 4y ago

Life long Texan here. Some of y'all need to get this setting your house temp to 78° figured out. 78 is damned comfortable, even in high humidity, as long as you have your ceiling fans on moving that air around. Don't have ceiling fans? Better get them installed in every room. Lowes and Home Depot regularly sell ceiling fans that are $35 that are quiet and run just fine. Sure 78 isn't as cold as 72 or 68 that many of y'all like keeping your houses in the summer, but it sure as hell beats the indoor temps of 95+ when you don't have power.

BenjiWiebe 4y ago
Kansan here, agreed. My family likes to keep the temperature in the house around 70... To me that's even a bit cold. And that's without ceiling fans (nearly no moving air).
sgt 4y ago
Is it common for people in TX to run their AC's all day?
- finiteseries 4y ago
  It’s very common throughout hot & humid climates in the US to leave the central air conditioner maintaining set temperatures all day. How often it’s actually blowing cool dry air out of all the vents depends on the unit/weather/setting/insulation etc.
  - chrisdhoover 4y ago
    With the thermostat set at 78. The air cycles on at about 2 in the afternoon. At about 6 it stops. The out side temperature has been dropping from the 90s to the 70’s overnight
- stjohnswarts 4y ago
  the thermostat will dictate if that's necessary. Modern homes tend to have really good insulation. Older homes though can be horrible at efficiency but most people will get after market spray foams in their walls because it's pretty cheap compared to year after year AC bills of $400

chroem- 4y ago

Is California still experiencing rolling brownouts?

nradov 4y ago
California last had large scale rolling blackouts (load shedding) during the 2020 summer heat wave. There's a good chance of similar problems this summer since we haven't done much to improve the system. https://www.powergrid.news/2020-08-19-blackouts-demonstrate-green-power-grid-failure.html https://www.powergrid.news/2020-08-19-blackouts-demonstrate-...

walnutclosefarm 4y ago

I know I'm a cranky old man, but who publishes essay-length analyses via twitter? Just. Dumb.

paulmd 4y ago
Sadly, nobody is going to pay attention to an essay in a journal or an opinion piece in a newspaper. Twitter gets attention. This is probably especially true in Texas where one of the defining characteristics of the controlling party of the one-party state (thanks to intense gerrymandering) is anti-intellectualism. They not only won't listen to "liberal academics" or opinion pieces in "liberal newspapers", they'll actively oppose whatever they say on the simple basis of who said it.
- meatsauce 4y ago
  To be fair, most of what comes out of a liberal's mouth is usually emotionally charged narrative-craft, and has no bearing on practical reality, and therefore can be safely ignored.

newaccount2021 4y ago

gzer0 4y ago

And this is precisely why I decided to bite the bullet and install solar + 2 Powerwall batteries for backup. No longer need to worry about the clowns in office since clearly they have not learned from the February 2021 debacle.

stjohnswarts 4y ago
How much was that? about $40k?
- gzer0 4y ago
  * 4.80 kW Solar Panels -- +$12,576 * 2 Powerwall Batteries -- +$18,500 * Cash Price -- +$31,076 * Federal Tax Credit -$8,080 * --------------------- * Net Price: $22,996 Tesla Solar (yes, cheaper options exist. Tesla solar was the best for me and the least hassle, AIO solution). I know this sounds like a bizarre setup (4.80 kW?) but my main goal was to be able to have two Powerwall backups that I would have incase the grid fails me. I charge the Powerwalls at night during offpeak hours for free and keep them near 100%. 29% of my energy needs are offset with the 4.80kW panels. I plan to add more powerful solar panels soon. 9.6kW panels would allow me to offset 58% of my energy needs; it would add on $12k to my costs, but I am safe knowing that I don't need to completely rely on ERCOT and their mafia anymore (to an extent). TL;DR $23k USD. I was able to get a 0% APR loan as well, so I'm paying around $130 / month. After including the energy generated/offset, it goes to net ~$93 month.
  - Ekaros 4y ago
    Wait how is electricity free during night? Is there so much wind that it is free already?
    - gzer0 4y ago
      Nights Free Plan - Use most of your electricity from 9 pm to 7 am every day to take advantage of this plan. [1] https://justenergy.com/get-offer/free-nights-or-weekends-electricity-plan/ https://justenergy.com/get-offer/free-nights-or-weekends-ele...

csours 4y ago

People who get really mad at ERCOT, please also look into the roles that the Public Utility Commission and the Railroad Commission play in the Texas energy market. ERCOT has some responsibility, but it seems to me that they are mainly the scapegoat.

stjohnswarts 4y ago
It really isn't ERCOT, it's the Texas government that is the problem. ERCOT has -very- limited power over things. They have very limited power over the power providers in the state.

tekstar 4y ago

When I learnt about how the Texas grid was a disconnected electrical island I thought maybe there is now a market to charge transport-trailer sized batteries out of state, drive them into Texas and drain them into the grid.

wmf 4y ago
Or just leave the batteries permanently installed in Texas, charge them overnight, and discharge them during the day. https://electrek.co/2022/01/06/tesla-unveils-giant-megapack-battery-project-texas/ https://electrek.co/2022/01/06/tesla-unveils-giant-megapack-... The price of electricity was near zero from 2-4 AM last night.
stjohnswarts 4y ago
Texas grid is big enough to do fine on it's own. The problem is that power providers (and gas companies) are given the upper hand and never had to winterize more than a token amount, hence the house of cards came down last February and around 500 people died as a result. The Texas lege passed an "oops" bill that put on a couple bandaids, but the same thing is bound to happen again with the next big Freeze comes along.

kardianos 4y ago

I don't see sources. ERCOT's sites show plenty of reserve. I've not experienced any power issues. It sounds like someone is not telling the truth.

WalterGR 4y ago
> I've not experienced any power issues. Your personal experience doesn't appear to be universal. There's plenty of news coverage about six power plants going offline because of high usage: https://www.google.com/search?q=ercot+six https://www.google.com/search?q=ercot+six > It sounds like someone is not telling the truth. Are you sure you're not from Missouri? (The "Show Me" state. Ba dum tish.)
- kardianos 4y ago
  Power plants come on and go off all the time. That's a far cry from grid failure.

BonoboIO 4y ago

Lyrics of the Official state song: „ Texas, Our Texas! All hail the mighty State! Texas, Our Texas! So wonderful, so great! Boldest and grandest, withstanding ev'ry test O Empire wide and glorious, you stand supremely blest.“ What a Match

bediger4000 4y ago

That's good! Market forces at work mean that production almost exactly meets demand.

windows2020 4y ago

Nice try, Federal Government.

sylware 4y ago

could we get a nitter link with those kind of twitter "news", that to work with noscript/basic (x)html browsers out-of-the-box.