The Biden administration accidentally showed its hand with its new report from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) claiming to uncover the culprit of the Texas blackouts.
Unfortunately, FERC’s report is far from exhaustive and severely swayed by political bias, making it clear Biden’s priority is pushing his political agenda, not getting down to the facts.
FERC’s report cherry-picks data favorable to Biden’s big-government agenda, blaming Texas’ limited-regulation philosophy without evidence and blindly pointing the finger at fossil fuels without context — even though reliable fossil fuels saved countless lives during the winter storm.
FERC’s report completely overlooks the real causes of the systemic weakness plaguing the Texas grid.
Over the last decade, the Lone Star State’s population and economy have boomed. You’d think the energy state would have responded in kind by building more thermal (natural gas, coal, and nuclear) power plants to accommodate that growth — but, unfortunately for Texans, you’d be dead wrong.
Over that same time period, Texas closed 4,000 megawatts of reliable natural gas and clean coal power plants. Wind and solar capacity on the grid nearly tripled, but as Texans learned firsthand, capacity does not equal actual electricity.
Because renewables produce, on average, between just 16% and 46% of their aggregate installed capacity during peak demand hours — whereas fossil fuels consistently operate at well over 90% capacity — we can’t rely on these weather-dependent generators to show up when we need them.
At the height of the winter storm, it was the dead of night, and wind turbines were producing as little as 1.5% of their total capacity.
The media was quick to trumpet that renewables exceeded expectations and couldn’t be blamed — but it’s hard to ask families shivering in the cold and dark to celebrate, especially when the bar was set so low that 1.5% was considered a raving success.
This isn’t a new problem for Texas. Two years ago, the grid came dangerously close to blackouts when the electricity demand during a searing summer day coincided with low wind production.
The only reason we’ve avoided summer blackouts since then is some combination of reduced demand due to the COVID-19 shutdowns and sheer dumb luck. It’s only a matter of time before the weather refuses to cooperate on a high-demand day, the wind doesn’t blow when we need it, and blackouts occur again.
Of course, it’s true that wind and solar weren’t the only power sources with problems during the storm. Several natural gas plants went offline due to weather-related issues, leading many legislators to call for more weatherization funding.
But weatherization would be a Band-aid at best.
Texas’ grid data shows that the state never had enough reliable capacity to get through the storm without blackouts.
Even if every single power plant had been operating at total capacity and every wind turbine had been spinning away as it would on a typical day, there would still have been significant supply shortages causing blackouts.
That’s because natural gas wasn’t the problem. In fact, natural gas saved countless lives during the blackouts. At the peak of the storm, while the wind had almost entirely dropped off the grid, coal generation increased 47%, and natural gas generation increased 450%.
The 25 million Texans whose power stayed on, and those who enjoyed at least intermittent power during the blackouts, have fossil fuels to thank for their warmth and safety.
The Biden administration claims Texas’ limited-government philosophy is entirely to blame for this catastrophe. Actually, big government is the problem.
Hundreds of billions of our tax dollars have been spent subsidizing renewable energy, interfering with the free market, and creating an artificial financial advantage that all but guarantees them a profit.
Oil, gas, and coal are subsidized, too, but at a far lower rate per unit of electricity generated. Wind and solar receive 17 and 75 times more taxpayer funds per megawatt, respectively.
As I explained in a recent PragerU video unpacking the causes of the Texas blackouts, the consequences of these market-distorting subsidies have been deadly.
Imagine owning a successful local restaurant when suddenly your competitor down the street starts getting subsidies — so much he can actually pay his customers to eat his food.
It’s no wonder your business will suffer, even if your food tastes better, while he profits unfairly off the taxpayers’ backs.
Similarly, it’s no wonder fossil fuel plants are closing in Texas — even when they are clearly better suited to provide the affordable, reliable energy we need — when it’s almost impossible for them to succeed.
Biden’s desire for the federal government to regulate every aspect of our lives and his green agenda to put solar panels on every roof won’t prevent more blackouts.
Read more at Washington Times
Excellent Richard
But why not have an effigy of Don Quixote
attached to each windmill as a reminder ?
This article is biased.
The FERC report in August 2011 explained a large rolling blackout problem in February 2011. The date of that report could have been changed to 2021 and a chapter could have been added on windmills, to create a new 2021 FERC report.
Recommendations from the 2011 report were ignored. At the time, Texas wind power capacity was tiny and barely mentioned — it was unusually cold weather that caused the 2011 rolling blackouts, that affected 3.2 million Texans.
The author of this article seems confused. Lack of “weatherization” of the ENTIRE Texas energy infrastructure, beyond just power plants, was the primary problem in 2021 Same as in 2011 … but worse in 2021 because the weather was colder and the unusually cold weather lasted longer than in 2011.
Concerning the windmills.
They worked just as they were designed to work (highly variable, unpredictable output that needs at least 100% fossil fueled backup).
Since Texas does not believe in winterization, their windmills were purchased without optional blade deicers. So they can only produce energy when the wind is roughly 7mph, or more, and the blades are not iced.
That sound like a very unreliable source of energy for an electric grid, where reliability is the primary objective. ERCOT was expecting very low wind power in February 2021, and with windmills, there are always a few hours a month with almost no wind power.
The actual wind power due to frozen blades was about two-thirds of the expected low output — and down in the 1% to 2% range in the hours before the blackouts.
That low amount of wind power should have been easily offset by more fossil fuel power. But cold weather problems affected fossil fuel (and nuclear) power just as it had in 2011, and before that at least once in the 1980s.
Windmills did not “fail” in Texas — they did what they were engineered to do — which is pitiful performance when compared with fossil fuel power sources.
The cold weather problem in Texas has existed for at least 40 years,
Unusually cold weather hurt Texas electricity consumers in February 2011, and February 2021, and will never be fixed, IMHO, because the cost is too high and there could be a zero return on the investment.
The decision to not winterize in 2011 looked wise for the next 10 years ,,, as the state of Texas guaranteed good financial returns on windmills, so their capacity multiplied by about 8x in the next 10 years. The problem with all windmills is:
One windmill + no wind = no electricity
One bazillion windmills + no wind = no electricity
Windmills belong in museums, nit attached to electric grids !
Excellent..
Thanks Richard..