3 ms·

> the absolute magnitude of electricity demand wasn’t that different. The magnitude of electricity demand increased by more than the entire state of most state

> the absolute magnitude of electricity demand wasn’t that different. The magnitude of electricity demand increased by more than the entire state of most states' entire generation capacities. I do agree, the main root cause for the power going out so bad was power was cut to natural gas processing which caused shortfalls of natural gas which couldn't be alleviated until things thawed. But in 2011, that would have just been overnight since it got above freezing every day. It took several days to get above freezing in 2021. Things are pretty different when it's below freezing multiple days in a row, and that just doesn't normally happen in most of Texas. It's pretty different having your highs be in the 20s versus the upper 30s and low 40s. I've never seen ice accumulate on a pool in Texas. In 2021 it formed over an inch on my pool, and I never lost power. If that's not an obvious indicator the cold was way more I don't know what to tell you.

Retric 3y ago
New York State is part of a larger grid and imports a great deal of electricity. Critically only 1 in 7 households heat with electricity in NY (vs 2/3 in Texas) and they have much better insulation so demand isn’t particularly impacted by winter storms. Texas has intentionally set itself up for failure from winter storms in a multitude of ways but primarily not paying companies for reserve capacity. Your area may have gotten above freezing every day in 2011 but that wasn’t true statewide. El Paso airport recorded February 2 High 15, Low 6f, February 3 High 18f, Low 1f, February 4 High 37f, Low 3f, and that was kicked off by a low of 14 on February 1st. https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/cdo-web/datasets/GHCND/stations/GHCND:USW00023044/detail https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/cdo-web/datasets/GHCND/stations/GH... And they didn’t see such extreme weather in 2021.
- vel0city 3y ago
  > Your area may have gotten above freezing every day in 2011 Yeah, my area and most of the rest of the state. And pretty much every major population center. That's a massive difference. You're pointing to one of the smaller/midsize cities that isn't even a part of ERCOT. It really shows how much you don't understand about the situation if you're arguing the state of Texas' grid and using weather data from El Paso to back your argument. El Paso is one of the coldest cities in Texas in the winter. Its not indicative of most of the state. And its not connected anyways. You should have picked Amarillo if you wanted to single out a cold city for an imbalanced data point, at least it would have been connected to ERCOT. 2021 was way colder for the entire state. That makes a massive difference.
  - Retric 3y ago
    > 2021 was way colder for the entire state. Except not the entire state, I was pointing to one of several areas that got above freezing every day in 2021 while also being dramatically colder in 2011. So your experience wasn’t shared across the entire state just the highest population areas. As to ERCOT seriously fucking everything up, well yea that’s completely accurate. Yet, Foard County along several other counties are within ERCOT and didn’t lose power from the 2021 storm. Those are low population areas, but understanding why power outages where continuous relates both to lack of power but also an inability to route available power.
    - vel0city 3y ago
      > So your experience wasn’t shared across the entire state just the highest population areas. Gee, wonder where the majority of the energy usage is...
      - Retric 3y ago
        Highest density isn’t the majority. Roughly 1/2 the population had any power distributions from the 2021 storm, and many of those were fairly minor. The lack of transmission infrastructure meant they couldn’t spread the pain evenly across the state and thus it concentrated on ~4 million customers who got absolutely fucked.
        vel0city 3y ago
        Houston, Austin, DFW, San Antonio metro areas is like 20/29 million. If 20 out of 29 isn't a majority I don't know what to say. Keep proving to me you don't understand what you're talking about if you want. I'm probably done after having to say 20/29 is greater than 50% and point out El Paso isn't in ERCOT.
        Retric 3y ago
        Most of the Texas triangle is rural. When they say 20 million people in the Texas triangle they are including many farmers etc who aren’t living in a town or city. As to different experiences: https://publichealthmaps.org/motw-2021/2021/2/17/17-february-2021-state-of-texas-power-outage-map-united-states https://publichealthmaps.org/motw-2021/2021/2/17/17-february... Wilson, Guadalupe and a few outer counties within that metro area didn’t lose power, others had saw only a fraction of their area suffer blackouts. “At the peak, over 5 million people in Texas were without power,[67] with 11 million experiencing an outage at some point,[22] some for more than 3 days.[68]” out of 29 million that’s a long way from 50%. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Texas_power_crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Texas_power_crisis Similarly the temperatures experienced across the Texas triangle varied significantly, it’s a big area. (The site I use for weather data seems to be down for maintenance.)

Retric 3y ago

New York State is part of a larger grid and imports a great deal of electricity. Critically only 1 in 7 households heat with electricity in NY (vs 2/3 in Texas) and they have much better insulation so demand isn’t particularly impacted by winter storms. Texas has intentionally set itself up for failure from winter storms in a multitude of ways but primarily not paying companies for reserve capacity. Your area may have gotten above freezing every day in 2011 but that wasn’t true statewide. El Paso airport recorded February 2 High 15, Low 6f, February 3 High 18f, Low 1f, February 4 High 37f, Low 3f, and that was kicked off by a low of 14 on February 1st. https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/cdo-web/datasets/GHCND/stations/GHCND:USW00023044/detail https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/cdo-web/datasets/GHCND/stations/GH... And they didn’t see such extreme weather in 2021.

vel0city 3y ago
> Your area may have gotten above freezing every day in 2011 Yeah, my area and most of the rest of the state. And pretty much every major population center. That's a massive difference. You're pointing to one of the smaller/midsize cities that isn't even a part of ERCOT. It really shows how much you don't understand about the situation if you're arguing the state of Texas' grid and using weather data from El Paso to back your argument. El Paso is one of the coldest cities in Texas in the winter. Its not indicative of most of the state. And its not connected anyways. You should have picked Amarillo if you wanted to single out a cold city for an imbalanced data point, at least it would have been connected to ERCOT. 2021 was way colder for the entire state. That makes a massive difference.
- Retric 3y ago
  > 2021 was way colder for the entire state. Except not the entire state, I was pointing to one of several areas that got above freezing every day in 2021 while also being dramatically colder in 2011. So your experience wasn’t shared across the entire state just the highest population areas. As to ERCOT seriously fucking everything up, well yea that’s completely accurate. Yet, Foard County along several other counties are within ERCOT and didn’t lose power from the 2021 storm. Those are low population areas, but understanding why power outages where continuous relates both to lack of power but also an inability to route available power.
  - vel0city 3y ago
    > So your experience wasn’t shared across the entire state just the highest population areas. Gee, wonder where the majority of the energy usage is...
    - Retric 3y ago
      Highest density isn’t the majority. Roughly 1/2 the population had any power distributions from the 2021 storm, and many of those were fairly minor. The lack of transmission infrastructure meant they couldn’t spread the pain evenly across the state and thus it concentrated on ~4 million customers who got absolutely fucked.
      - vel0city 3y ago
        Houston, Austin, DFW, San Antonio metro areas is like 20/29 million. If 20 out of 29 isn't a majority I don't know what to say. Keep proving to me you don't understand what you're talking about if you want. I'm probably done after having to say 20/29 is greater than 50% and point out El Paso isn't in ERCOT.
        Retric 3y ago
        Most of the Texas triangle is rural. When they say 20 million people in the Texas triangle they are including many farmers etc who aren’t living in a town or city. As to different experiences: https://publichealthmaps.org/motw-2021/2021/2/17/17-february-2021-state-of-texas-power-outage-map-united-states https://publichealthmaps.org/motw-2021/2021/2/17/17-february... Wilson, Guadalupe and a few outer counties within that metro area didn’t lose power, others had saw only a fraction of their area suffer blackouts. “At the peak, over 5 million people in Texas were without power,[67] with 11 million experiencing an outage at some point,[22] some for more than 3 days.[68]” out of 29 million that’s a long way from 50%. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Texas_power_crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Texas_power_crisis Similarly the temperatures experienced across the Texas triangle varied significantly, it’s a big area. (The site I use for weather data seems to be down for maintenance.)