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Workers repair a power line in Austin, Texas, U.S., Wednesday, February 18, 2021.
Thomas Ryan Allison | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner on Sunday called on the state of Texas to pay the huge electricity bills reported by many Texans after harsh winter weather cut off power and raised energy prices.
The frigid conditions of the past week caused major grid outages and skyrocketing demand that left millions of people without heat and electricity. Now, as electricity picks up in most of Texas, some households are facing utility bills as high as $ 10,000.
“For the people who get these sky-high electricity bills and have to pay to fix their homes, they shouldn’t have to take responsibility,” Turner said in an interview on CBS “Face the Nation”. “These exorbitant costs should be borne by the State of Texas and not by the individual customers who have not caused this disaster this week.”
The high electricity bills in Texas are due to the state’s unregulated power grid which is nearly cut off from the rest of the country. In the market-oriented system, customers choose their own electricity suppliers. In many cases, when demand increases, prices also increase.
The Texas Electric Reliability Council (ERCOT), which manages electricity for about 90% of the state, was unprepared for the cold conditions and surging demand for electricity as people tried to heat their homes.
“Everything that happened in the past week was predictable and preventable. Our system in Texas is designed for summer heat and not necessarily for a winter event,” Turner said.
“Climate change is real and these major storms can happen at any time,” he added. “These systems have to be tampered with … we have to open up the Texas network.”
The sky-high bills prompted Republican Gov. Greg Abbott to hold an emergency meeting with lawmakers to examine how the state can reduce the burden on consumers.
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“We have a responsibility to protect Texans from spikes in their energy bills that are the result of harsh winter weather and power outages,” Abbott said in a statement following the meeting.
“We are moving quickly to alleviate this issue and will continue to work collaboratively throughout this week on solutions to help Texas families and ensure they don’t end up with skyrocketing energy bills. Abbott added.
Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas., Said in an interview on CNN on Sunday that the state would use federal government disaster relief funding to support customers with high utility payments.
After more than 3 million people in Texas lost power last week, ERCOT said it was back to normal and restored power to millions of customers. More than 30,000 people in Texas still had no electricity as of 11:30 a.m. Sunday morning, according to recent data from PowerOutage.us.
More than 1,300 public water systems were disrupted by the extreme weather conditions and more than 15 million people were ordered to boil their water on Saturday, according to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.
President Joe Biden on Saturday approved a declaration of major disaster for 77 counties in Texas, unlocking federal aid to Texans, grants for temporary housing and home repairs, and low-cost loans to cover losses of uninsured property . The state’s goal is ultimately to have all 254 counties under the declaration.
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