Posted on 03/01/2021 4:01:47 AM PST by Oldeconomybuyer
HOUSTON - Texas’s largest and oldest electric power cooperative on Monday filed for bankruptcy protection in federal court in Houston, citing a disputed $1.8 billion bill from the state’s grid operator.
Brazos Electric Power Cooperative Inc is one of dozens of electricity providers facing enormous charges stemming from a severe cold snap last month. The fallout threatens utilities and power marketers who collectively face billions of dollars in blackout-related charges, executives said.
Unusually frigid temperatures knocked out nearly half of the state’s power plants in mid-February, leaving 4.3 million people without heat or light for days and bursting water pipes that damaged homes and businesses. Brazos and others that committed to provide power to the grid and could not, were required to buy replacement power at high rates and cover other firms’ unpaid fees.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
There is going to be a lot of that.
The PUC, whose board is completely made up of Governor A ott’s appointees, made ERCOT artifically increase the price of kilowatt-hours to $9,000 from $1,200, and stuck it there for 90 hours.
https://www.texastribune.org/2021/02/25/texas-power-grid-ercot-puc-greg-abbott/
Governor Abbott is responsible for bankrupting firms from fake power costs during the worst possible time to do so.
There is something missing from this article. I read that Texas’ governor called the White House to get a temporary suspension of the EPA rules that forbade the Texas power producers from operating at full capacity. Biden allegedly told the governor he would waive the rules if Texas would agree to a huge increase in their electric power prices.
Several things were not explained in that article. Why didn’t the governor tell Biden to shove it and order the companies to go full out and then fight the issue in court?
If what I described happened, the EPA has the power to bankrupt any power company. Also, why were the grid prices of shared power bumped up? If you did that in Florida, you would go to prison for profiteering*.
* Not sure if that’s the term. But if a hurricane hits and you load up with water and generators and take them to the affected area, you can’t charge any more for the items than you paid. Thus, those areas are well and truly foo-caid.
The waivers were automatic as long as power cost $1,500 a megawatt-hour.
The prices should read $1,200 and $9,000 per MEGAwatt-hour.
It’s $1.20 and $9 a kilowatt-hour.
My bad.
Obviously, it’s time to nationalize Texas’s electrical grid.
SloJoe can run it better than the electrical companies...
“The waivers were automatic as long as power cost $1,500 a megawatt-hour.”
I recall the cost from the article. How does that compare with the regular cost? Also, why? Assuming it’s lots of extra money, who gets that money? (I hate it that article authors often leave out the most important part of the information they are conveying.)
Normal realtime prices per megawatt hour are here:
http://www.ercot.com/content/cdr/html/real_time_spp
You will note that for today, you actually got paid to use power in the early morning hours.
Look at the three members of PUC. An accountant, a lawyer lobbies, and a guy with a BS in chemistry who went directly into banking. All political hacks who couldn’t operate a Honda generator.
More like they’re filing bankruptcy due to the coming law suits from customers freezing to death.
I still want to know why our subdivision had blackouts. 90 houses but only 6 houses with permanent residents. Mostly tourists who use tons more electricity for a/c in the tourist season. The power company can keep up with all those a/c 24/7 but had to cut the power on 6 houses last week. We’re on the border line to the next subdivision which had their lights on more than us.
Multiply the same full time vs vacay homes all over this area. No freakin’ way were the residents putting any strain on the power supply.
That said, the power company did wake the heck up and turn ours back on in shorter cycles and was able to send power elsewhere in the state.
Thank you. There are no units given. Is that, say xx.xx per kilowatt hour? Then the price Biden wanted would be x,xxx.xx per kilowatt hour? I am on a phone and surfing around is impractical. Thanks again.
I know “a little” about bankruptcy and this filing by Brazos seems waaaayyyyy too fast and therefore unnecessary at this time. The so called “storm” only happened a couple weeks ago.
The predicament that Texas finds itself in is a direct result of the deregulation craze that swept the nations utilities starting back in the 80’s. This was all done under the guise of reducing the cost to the consumer. As usual the results, catastrophically the opposite. When the the electric utilities operated under the benevolent monopoly model it worked mush better than what’s in place today.
That makes sense because temps right now in TX are temperate, so little need for heating or a/c.
Somebody believed the hogwash about global warming and their facilities weren’t robust against a harsh cold wave.
So the folks there have to decide...save money and have periodic outages during occasional temp swings on the low and high side, or put in capital and maintenance costs to be make the facilities robust.
The prices on that page are cost per megawatt-hour.
So if you see “22.00,” that is $22.00 a megawatt hour, which equates to $0.02 a kilowatt hour.
The PUC made ERCOT artificially force the price to $9,000 a megawatt hour, or $9 a kilowatt hour, for 90 hours.
Actually, the normal price delivered is well under 10 cents a kilowatt hour to a home on any contract on the official Texas “Power To Choose” site, which defaults to flat fees per kilowatt hour.
You pick your term and it gives you the options.
Until two weeks ago, the prices for annual or even three year contracts were under 9 cents a kilowatt hour.
Those rates are much less than people pay in other states, by the way.
Just to put it in perspective, those with locked in rates are fine which is the majority of consumers. My bill actually went down $10 this month. I owe $91.35. The people that got hit mainly were from a company called Griddy. They(the consumers) were buying wholesale electricity so it was about 1/2 most of the time with some variance. It is also charged weekly which is why bills went out so fast. The wholesale price went clearly out of control. It was a cheap way to pay electricity but the gamble did not pay off.
Actually, I think Griddy forces a prepay in $50 increments, so it could have been happening hourly at high prices.
The rates were fake. WSJ had an article that showed the PUC forced ERCOT to artificially inflate realtime pricing from $1,200 to $9,000 a megawatt hour for 90 hours. $9,000 is the normal maximum ERCOT allows prices to reach.
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