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An Insider Explains Why Texans Lost Their Power
American Thinker.com ^ | February 20, 2021 | Vic Hughes

Posted on 02/20/2021 4:12:59 AM PST by Kaslin

How would your family, and a hundred thousand other families, like to be stuck in your cars for days at minus 16 degrees?

The death toll would be huge. It almost happened in New England in 1989.

And in Texas this week.

I was part of the 1989 Freeze and have some hopefully interesting insights.

In 1989, the weather just before Christmas was terrible. Cold temperature records were set from Texas to New England.

That year, I was responsible for a midcontinent gas gathering system that normally produced about 500 million cubic feet (MMCFD) of natural gas a day. That could supply up to 2 million New England homes. During the 1989 Freeze, we produced 30 MMCFD, roughly a 95% decline. Similar results were happening throughout the Oil Patch. Supply cratered.

Meanwhile, demand for natural gas was exploding, almost literally (more on that below). While the midcontinent temperatures were low enough to freeze gas wells, New England had dangerous arctic temperatures of minus 16 degrees. This created huge natural gas demand for home heating in a major New England town.

The city ultimately weathered that crisis through luck.

Several years later, I was fortunate enough to get to know some of the city's gas utility personnel who were operating the gas grid during the Freeze. They gave me invaluable insights into what really happened. (I promised the operators I would not name the city.)

(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial
KEYWORDS: energy; power; storm; texas
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To: marktwain

The wind “mills” froze. It started the domino fall.

Minnesota, Wisconsin, NY, etc.... all have way, way worse weather and I don’t think they rely on wind or solar. How about hiring someone from one of those states to run the grid in TX, I think they would have had much better back up in place.


121 posted on 02/20/2021 3:30:20 PM PST by Baldwin77 (The 2020 election was stolen from MY President Trump)
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To: Sawdring
I helped feed a similar wood/coal burner when I was growing up.

I hated it. The amount of wood it took was enormous. The amount of time it took to process the wood and feed it was enormous, often at the coldest, nastiest time of year.

I would view it differently now, but there is a reason I am living in Arizona, and not Wisconsin, for the past 31 years (mostly it is where the career lead).

122 posted on 02/20/2021 3:43:24 PM PST by marktwain (President Trump and his supporters are the Resistance. His opponents are the Reactionaries. )
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To: Sawdring

I am sure many people wished they had alternate source of heating instead of relying on the grid.

I use wood heat.

The stoves now days are much more efficient and the house better insulated.

I burn a third of the wood then in the old farm house I grew up in with a big coal wood furnace.


123 posted on 02/21/2021 5:17:53 AM PST by riverrunner
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To: Alberta's Child

Oh really,Ted Danson in 1980 was warning the earth had 10 years until total destruction because of Global warming,climate lunatics,that was 40; years ago


124 posted on 02/21/2021 5:37:45 AM PST by ballplayer
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To: ballplayer
Oh really,Ted Danson in 1980 was warning the earth had 10 years until total destruction because of Global warming,climate lunatics,that was 40 years ago...

We know these people are fools. The problem is the press is worse.

No matter how silly they are - or how many times they're dead wrong, the idiots in the press believe them. It's like 'crying wolf' a thousand times and 'journalists' with wide eyed gullibility start running.

125 posted on 02/21/2021 8:14:41 AM PST by GOPJ (...assign a value to grid reliability and resiliency - Texan Chuck DeVore)
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To: BigpapaBo

. To self


126 posted on 02/24/2021 6:42:14 AM PST by BigpapaBo (If it don't kill you it'll make you _________!)
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