The ensuing crisis could be a blessing in disguise for Biden’s proposal to spend large sums of money to harden the country’s electricity grid, as it connects large wind and solar power plants with cities and states thousands of miles away. This is a necessary step if the US is going to make a big turn to rely on solar, wind and other renewable energy to keep the lights on.
“If the offer does not turn up, legislative or regulatory intervention will begin,” said Kevin Book, managing director at ClearView Energy Partners. “The reactivity to a supply shock is one of the few things you can rely on.”
The icy temperature has pushed the demand for energy in Texas to levels that have obscured even the hottest summer days. Network operators there and across the Middle East have implemented rolling power barriers to prevent further damage to the network, but in Texas alone, 4 million customers have been without power since Monday.
Investigations into the causes have only just begun, but data from the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which operates the state’s electrical network, showed that at least 30 gigawatts of power powered by natural gas, coal and nuclear power went off line Monday. , together with 16 gigawatts. of renewable energy.
National Republicans – and those with national aspirations – grabbed photos of frozen wind turbines to hammer Washington’s green energy agenda, even though Texas operated a network outside of federal oversight and made its own energy decisions for decades.
“If the last few days have proved anything, it is that we need oil and gas,”tweeted George P. Bush, who as Texas commissioner oversees much of the state’s oil and gas production. “Relying solely on renewable energy would be catastrophic. Many of these sources appear to be unreliable. ”
“Texas is solidly frozen because people do not have the power to stay safe and warm,” Senator Steve Daines (R-Mont.) Tweeted Tuesday. “This is a perfect example of the need for reliable energy sources such as natural gas and coal.”
But the extreme cold also shut down a large portion of the fossil fuels. Natural gas wells froze, and coal and nuclear power generators in Texas were thrown off line, such as Abbott himself admits.
In addition, the national debate on green energy versus fossil fuels is no longer 10 to 20 years ago. The balance of power has shifted as the automotive industry, Wall Street and even some fossil fuel companies pursue renewable energy and form the transition from millions of dollars to cleaner energy, a shift they are defending on economic grounds.
“Wind and solar power and increasing storage are the most cost-competitive options on the network,” said Jeff Dennis, managing director of Advanced Energy Economy, a national association of large power users and other businesses that strive for clean energy. said. “There is a real issue to rapidly increase our investment in that technology to improve our reliability and our resilience.”
The move made the usual Washington debt game less one-sided. Biden’s allies inside and outside the government have spread the message that the Arctic explosion has the urgency to counter climate change, and that it’s another foretaste of the disasters the country can expect from extreme weather.
“We need to think about how our overall infrastructure can accommodate more and more common events,” Sean Casten (D-Ill.) Said. “It’s tragic that so many people across the aisle are using it to bash renewable energy.”
Clean energy groups quickly supported Democrats. The U.S. Renewable Energy Council, a trade group for clean energy enterprises, said specific regional conditions exacerbated the Texas crisis. from other regions. In contrast, parts of the Middle East that avoided the fate of Texas are members of local power grids connected by high-voltage equipment.
ACORE said the expansion of the interstate power lines would make the network more resilient and prevent future crises.
“It is time for Congress to adopt an ambitious infrastructure initiative aimed at expanding and upgrading America’s network,” ACORE CEO Greg Wetstone said in a statement.
The Biden plan aims to green the economy and is likely to include money for additional transmission lines, weathering, battery storage, burial of power lines and other improvements to the power grid.
‘[The grid] really is the uber infrastructure and we need to make it resilient, ”said Melanie Kenderdine, a principal at the Energy Futures Initiative and former head of the energy department’s office for energy policy and systems analysis under President Barack Obama. ‘We need to think about laying the groundwork for critical infrastructure. Duration? Yes, but the entire state of Texas is closed as well. ”
Bill Magness, CEO of ERCOT, which manages the state network, said the extreme weather was an unprecedented existence in the operator’s existence, but that the operator had recovered some power from Tuesday night. Despite another storm in the forecast, slightly higher temperatures should cause more generators to return.
The White House, meanwhile, avoided getting involved in the debate.
The Biden administration is currently focusing on “ensuring that the millions of people in Texas affected by the storm get the relief they need,” press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters. “Obviously there are investments in future forms of energy across the country that they need to plan for in bad weather, but I think it’s a discussion and conversation that goes a little further.”
Zack Colman and Ben Lefebvre contributed to this report.