so the storm deaths will be listed as China Flu victims... right???
Posted on 02/19/2021 9:33:59 AM PST by AT7Saluki
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which manages 75 percent of the Lone Star State’s electric grid, did not conduct any on-site inspections of its power plants to evaluate their winter preparedness due to COVID-19 protocols, a report from NBC 5 in Dallas suggests.
Instead of sending inspectors to complete important examinations at state power facilities to ensure they were adequately equipped to handle winter weather and high electricity demands, ERCOT management chose to host “virtual tabletop exercises” for only a portion of their plants, keeping their in-person contact limited to prevent the spread of coronavirus.
Beyond permitting only 94 of the state’s 600 facilities to participate in the virtual meeting centered on preparing for winter, ERCOT also did not require any plants to adapt their protocols for the colder months, instead just offering a list of suggested guidance for plant operators to follow voluntarily.
(Excerpt) Read more at thefederalist.com ...
Covid fear seems to be the excuse for everything these days.
Meh. Wouldn’t have fixed anything anyway. This is the kind of breathless post-disaster story that basically means nothing.
Only 94 of 600 even got to participate, so I’d say, yes, it probably did have an effect.
Conditions statewide were more severe than usual this winter, but it’s a big state and there are some counties or providers that are accustomed to dealing with colder temperatures.
As a Texan I am not interested in excuses, reasons and causes of the inexcusable mess we just went through.
If Texans were in charge it wouldn’t have happened. Since when and why do we let people living in other states and countries be in charge of our electricity.
Texans better demand we govern and hire from Texans living in Texas. Then we can know where to go and get some real answers, not excuses.
As ,Maxine Waters said ... “find’em atta ga’ stashun ..
“
Covid-19 only started late in ‘19. For years and years prior to that the Texas windmills were still susceptible to icing and failure to operate during a cold spell.
Can’t any journalist apply any critical thinking skills in their publications?
As America’s Anchorman said, there is no news (journalism) anymore.
Spare me.
Incompetence and malfeasance, PERIOD.
The democrat policies have disastrous far reaching results.
Anything they are involved in results is a snowball effect beyond what the original intent wanted.
So, the 20 Texans that died related to the power outage died...from Covid.
Without covid I’m sure they’d have spent the billions before a disaster to prevent potentially hundreds of billions in damage. I have a bridge too..
so the storm deaths will be listed as China Flu victims... right???
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas name should be changed.
Remove the ‘Reliability’ part.
100%why is it whenever you see anything with a desired outcome in it's name, it never seems to happen...
all these Ayn Randian committees and commissions with names straight out of Atlas or Fountainhead are nothing more than full RAT employment systems all patting each other on the back till their arms get tired
fight the power
Hate to break it to you and all the other windmill strawmen it was not wind that collapsed the grid it was thermal megawatts lost due to the cold. I am an industry professional watched this happen in real time data stream. Wind is only expected to be at 10% of its rated capacity in winter. That’s 3100 megawatts out of 31,000 total capacity installed. Texas has 125,000 megawatts of power capacity. During the winter Texas expects 80,000 of the 125,000 to be available of that 80,000 only 3100 megawatts is relied upon to be wind at any given time. Peak power demand was 69,000 megawatts a new all time winter record. At the moment wind was generating 5200 megawatts more than the 10% that was expected of it. What failed is the natural gas grid went down to.critical levels due to a host of once in a generation storm issues. Particularly well heads froze and due to Texas not listening to us professionals about winterizing the lines methane hydrates formed in the lines due to lack of H2O scrubbers that we told them to install after 2011 snowmagedon. When the gas grid not critical levels power plants were cut off as priority always goes to residential for gas use. This caused 30,000 megawatts of gas turbines and combined cycle plants to trip in a fifteen minute time span. Had that not occurred there would have been plenty of power to cover the 69,000 megawatts of demand. Texas has more than enough thermal capacity to shut in every turbine and solar panel at any time. Like I said in winter the total grid capacity is 80,000+ megawatts wind is expected to be 3100 of that. Normal winter peak demands is in the 40_50000 megawatts range which gas alone could cover with coal or natural help. Texas as an enormous amount of gas turbine and GTCC installed when the gas grid goes down it nearly took us to a black start event and that would have been months without power truly biblical levels of human suffering. What this event showed the people actually in the energy industry is that Texas is overdependant on natural gas for power capacity it is the single point of failure for the whole grid now. If gas goes down there is not enough coal, wind, solar, or nuclear even at 100% for all of them to cover the loss of the gas capacity. ERCOT requires every wind and solar megawatt to be back up by reserves of gas turbines in a 1.15:1 ratio so that if wind drops out the turbines take over in winter that means 3600 megawatts of gas turbines are held in reserve to back up wind but if the gas grid also goes down then you now have a real problem.
Go to my prior posts the links to all the relevant information are in them.
Nothing wrong with on site employees getting virtual instructions if they’re qualified to do the job. If they aren’t qualified or the flat out don’t do the job out of laziness, then there’s the problem.
If this job involves one or two experienced employees to go out to a substation, then covid can’t be used as an excuse.
There is no excuse for so many to be without power for days on end unless the actual equipment broke.
In our area, there was plenty of power and they were sending some out of the area yet we still had outages until (I’m guessing) the locals started making their own decisions and not taking orders from ERCOT. This time of year, even with the freeze, we use a mere fraction of what the influx of summer tourists use.
Aha!
So this has something to do with the people they pay to provide electricity.
But they aren't required to actually demonstrate readiness.
"ERCOT also did not require any plants to adapt their protocols for the colder months, instead just offering a list of suggested guidance...
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