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Texas Governor Greg Abbott (right) has called on the state legislature to investigate the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) after the winter left millions of Texans without power.
Texas governor issued statement calling for grid operator reform to be prioritized as an emergency item during the legislative session to “ensure Texans never again experience power outages on the scale they have seen in recent years. days”.
“The Texas Electrical Reliability Council has been anything but reliable for the past 48 hours,” Abbott said in its statement. “Far too many Texans are without power and heat for their homes as our state faces freezing temperatures and harsh winter conditions. This is unacceptable.”
“The review of ERCOT’s preparations and decisions is an urgent element so that we can get a full picture of what caused this problem and find long-term solutions,” he added.
ERCOT faces backlash for its management of the state’s electricity grid which on Tuesday left more than 4.1 million people in Lone Star state without electricity after being broken by snow records and subzero temperatures.
Grid operator ordered utilities to start turning power outages Monday morning to deal with the high demand for electricity, and Monday evening, ERCOT ordered utilities such as Oncor to cut more electricity instead of expected restorations.
Oncor in a press release Tuesday said he could not cope with many blackouts on Monday night due to “poor grid conditions” which he said led to “long periods without power for many of our customers”.
“As soon as sufficient generation becomes available, we will revert to a steady rate of rotating service interruptions with the aim of providing any possible temporary relief to those who have been without power for the longest time,” the statement from Oncor said.
“At this time, ERCOT is unable to predict when grid conditions will stabilize, and urges all customers to prepare for continued extended outages,” the statement continued.
In a tweet on Tuesday morning, ERCOT predicted that it could recover electricity for “some customers” in the afternoon due to increased sources of wind and solar power and thermal generation. But the amount of energy restored depends on “the amount of production actually capable of coming online”.
We should be able to restore some customers this afternoon due to the additional wind and solar production, and the additional thermal production which has indicated to us that they plan to become available. But, how much we restore will depend on how much production is actually able to come online.
– ERCOT (@ERCOT_ISO) February 16, 2021
ERCOT makes recommendations to utility companies based on how much energy is available for safe use, and these utilities make the final decision on how to manage the energy, the CEO and Chairman said. from ERCOT, Bill Magnus, to NBC’s subsidiary, KXAN.
Winter storm turned deadly in Texas, with at least two deaths from carbon monoxide poisoning in Houston and two more men found dead along roads in the Houston area.
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