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LLast week, Malori Elsner’s family battled power outages at their poorly insulated rental home near Houston, Texas, burning cardboard in the fireplace to keep warm during a deadly blast in the Arctic.
But even as they endured the cold, their electric bills skyrocketed – Texas’ deregulated grid had gone haywire, and Elsner sat there helpless, “knowing that I weighed money, but didn’t no choice because it’s eight degrees outside.
Then a pipe burst in their attic. As the water cascaded through the garage, kitchen, and dining room, they ran frantically trying to figure out what to do – until Elsner hit a switch and electricity shot up his arm.
“At that point, I sprinted into the back yard and flipped the breaker,” she said. Their home was no longer structurally safe, and as they were packing to stay with a relative, their ceiling began to crumble.
After devastating winter conditions that left Texans shaking in the dark last week, warmer temperatures and open storefronts have restored a semblance of normalcy. But the remnants of the storm could haunt parts of the state for months, if not years, after the disasters escalated into a full-blown humanitarian crisis. Its impact on finances, health and homes, as well as the state’s politics and economy will not just fade now that the sun has returned and the media spotlight has passed.
The storm, quite simply, shocked the state. First there was freezing cold, then slippery roads and sidewalks caused by ice. And once large parts of Texas lost electricity, water, or both, what was originally a natural disaster turned into a technological failure that lasted for nearly a week. .
“They tell people to boil water,” said Robert Emery, vice president of security and professor at the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston. “But a lot of people don’t have power. So now what are you doing?
State-spoiled emergency management will have far-reaching consequences, from a disproportionate impact on already disadvantaged communities – often communities of color – to a potential spike in the cost of living. Cruel lawsuits could tear communities apart, and taxpayers will likely have to bail out the same fossil fuel companies responsible for the grid failure.
“I suspect it’s going to be very corrosive and disturbing,” said James Elliott, professor of sociology at Rice University. “People will not regain confidence in their institutions very quickly.
“In the long run, it might be good. I hope people will stay angry. I’m mad.”
A deadly storm, superimposed on a pandemic
“It’s one thing to be cold,” but “to be cold in the dark” is “even more miserable,” Emery said.
As millions of Texans went without electricity or clean water, sometimes for days, they turned to dangerous solutions like gas stoves, cars and generators for heat. Hundreds of people have suffered carbon monoxide poisoning. Others died of suspected hypothermia. Still others have been killed in house fires after lighting their chimneys.
Drivers sped past and crashed amid icy roads and faulty street lights, as cold-weather shelters filled with displaced people, despite Covid-19.
“People were already stressed out and facing a variety of challenges related to the pandemic, and then making it overlap was really really hard for all citizens of Texas,” Emery said.
Now, residents affected by the state’s shortage of plumbers, electricians and other skilled workers are trying to fix their homes on their own, threatening “an inevitable series of injuries,” Emery said. And, as the weather becomes more conducive to mold growth, the hidden damage from water leaks poses another threat to public health.
There are also possible ramifications for mental health. Families were already mourning over 42,000 Texans killed by Covid-19, and the winter storm brought more suffering, trauma and death.
“Resilience is one thing,” Elliott said. “Resilience when things just keep happening over and over again can kind of leave you without the ability to have hope.”
A blow to the Texas economy
Part of what makes Texas so attractive to residents and CEOs is its relative accessibility, compared to other trendy states such as New York and California.
But this month’s winter storm wasn’t an anomaly: Extreme weather events are expected to become even more frequent as climate change accelerates, and Texas remains incredibly vulnerable. After the calamity of last week, power plants, homes and businesses have no choice but to “winterize”.
These upgrades will come at a high price that will likely pass through to consumers, pushing up electricity rates, construction costs and insurance premiums, said Pia Orrenius, vice president and senior economist at the Federal Reserve Bank. from Dallas.
“It reduces that cost advantage that we have enjoyed for a long time,” said Orrenius.
The inability of officials to deal with the crisis could also have an impact on economic growth and job creation in Texas, even as it is on its way to becoming the next Silicon Valley. Big tech companies like Oracle and Hewlett Packard Enterprise have moved to Texas amid the coronavirus pandemic, partly driven by lower costs and favorable tax rates.
But after witnessing a total collapse of state infrastructure, businesses that need reliable sources of electricity and water to power their operations may rethink their decision, unless those concerns are in some way. so toned down, warned Lloyd Potter, the Texas state demographer and professor at the University of Texas at San Antonio.
This subsequent loss of high-paying, highly-skilled jobs would be a blow to Texans across the board, Potter said, but especially those lower on the socio-economic spectrum.
“In terms of scale and severity, [this] was, you know, more than anything we’ve known in the past, ”he said. “The consequences of not fixing it would be potentially pretty, quite strong.”
A disproportionate toll
“You don’t need a rocket scientist,” Elliott said. “Those who have the least resources to bounce back will suffer the most. And this suffering will be the most aggravated.
When the power grid failed last week, residents of underfunded and disadvantaged communities faced poor insulation, food shortages and a lack of shared circuits with critical infrastructure that would have kept their lights on.
Now, as the state undertakes repairs, the same inequalities are likely to influence who gets the much-needed funding – and who gets left behind.
“How we recover in the long term from these natural hazards is the real disaster,” Elliott said. “There is the event, but the disaster actually occurs as it unfolds.”
Although researchers are trying to push for more equity in disaster response, aid has historically gone to “whoever has lost the most, not the one who needs it most,” Elliott said – restoring the property and not the community.
This often exacerbates pre-existing wealth inequalities, and “the more damage there is in a place over time, the more unequal the wealth becomes,” explained Elliott.
Even the acute difficulties of the storm – burst pipes, hotel bills, etc. – will be the most difficult for Texans who are least able to manage them, because “unforeseen expenses are much more difficult for people … living from paycheck to paycheck,” Potter says.
The storm will also worsen the problems for families who have already lost income due to the recession caused by Covid-19, who now have to deal with home repairs and high electricity bills despite their depleted bank accounts.
“It came at a very unfortunate time when a lot of people were already struggling,” Orrenius said.
Earlier this week, Elsner’s belongings were still sitting in her kitchen, clinging, waiting for her owner to clean up so she can take inventory for an insurance claim.
Her family had tried to find a new place to live, but the houses were quickly disappearing from the market.
“This last year has been really tough here,” she said, “with these extraordinary disasters happening all the time and are constantly being hushed up.
“The city, the state – nobody does anything.”
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