During a historic cold moment that left millions of Texans without electricity, water and heat for days, it is alleged that the state’s use of renewable energy sources, specifically wind energy, is blamed, spread on television and social media. These allegations are misleading because they shift the blame for the crisis away from what has been the main cause so far: record cold temperatures affecting the generation and transportation of all fuels (including, but not limited to wind energy), combined with the inability of the state’s independent and isolated electricity network (operated by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT) to obtain supplies from elsewhere.
Public figures who reinforced this narrative include Texas Gov. Tucker Carlson, Greg Abbott, and Marjorie Taylor Greene, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, a Republican from Georgia.
On February 14, Carlson began telling his viewers that ‘a reckless reliance on windmills is the cause of this disaster’, claiming that ‘the windmills froze, so the power grid failed’ (here). The next day, Abbott said in an interview that the Texas crisis “shows how the Green New Deal would be a deadly deal for the United States” (here).
First-year representative Greene tweeted on Wednesday, February 18: “If accepted, the Green New Deal will literally kill people. Millions of people in TX have suffered with #rollingblackouts, and some have died due to reliance on ‘green’ energy. TX increases the use and prohibition of the export of clean and abundantly reliable (sic) natural gas for electricity ”(here).
Examples of social media posts that make similar claims about the power outages can be found here, here and here.
WHAT HAPPENS IN TEXAS?
A brutal winter storm that left millions without power along the U.S. Gulf Coast and caused power prices to rise highlighted the differences between Texas’ independent power grid and the rest of the United States (here).
Residents in more than 100 counties in Texas have been told to boil their drinking water as the treatment plants suffer from energy outages, officials said. More than 12 million people in the state – the second largest country with a population of about 29 million – either have no drinking water on tap in their homes, or have drinking water only occasionally available (here).
On February 17, there was 2.7 million households’ energy, officials said. With the freezing temperature expected over the weekend, lighting the lights will be a slow process as the state has lost 40% of its generation capacity, with natural gas wells and pipelines, along with wind turbines, frozen.
RENEWABLES IN TEXAS
It is true that the cold has forced many types of offshore energy generation, including freezing wind turbines (here).
Wind produces 20% of the total electricity in Texas, where natural gas produces 47.4%, coal 20.3% and solar 1.1% (here).
As USA Today reports here, Texas has emerged over the past few years as not only a national but also a world leader in building renewable energy. Leading energy consultant Wood Mackenzie calls the state ‘the center of the global corporate renewable energy market’ (here).
In November 2020, the Chicago Tribune reported here that most of the proposed projects are in the ERCOT pipeline for solar, wind and storage.
THE TEXAS POWER NET
Texas is the only state in the continental United States that manages an independent electricity network (here).
The problem? This means during critical weather conditions such as the storm, most of Texas cannot be connected to other grids, which are connected and can pull apart if needed. Overall, about 4.4 million customers were without power.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the network, which is operated by ERCOT, is not under federal supervision and is largely dependent on its own resources. Critics have said that the deregulated energy market in Texas has few financial incentives for entrepreneurs to prepare for the rare intense cold weather.
Natural gas sources and pipelines in Texas, the state’s largest energy-producing state, are not overwintering those further north, leading to many being turned off by the prolonged icy weather (here).
The storm put about a third of the state’s generating capacity off track. Contrary to comments by Marjorie Taylor Greene and others, the Texas power grid is heavily dependent on natural gas, which accounts for nearly half of the electricity generated (here).
In an official statement on February 15, ERCOT said that “extreme weather conditions have caused many generating units – across different fuels – to be pulled offline and unavailable” (here).
As reported here by the Texas Tribune on February 16, ERCOT said that thermal sources, such as coal, gas and nuclear power, lost almost twice as much power due to the cold as renewable energy sources, contributing to only 13% of the power has. interruptions (here).
As temperatures drop to record lows, a phenomenon known as ‘freeze-off’ is hitting parts of Texas hard, according to a report by The Verge (here). Due to natural gas wells and pipes being poorly equipped for cold weather, ‘liquid in wells, pipes and valves froze solidly.’
An article from the Washington Post explaining the connection between Texas’ independent power grid and its ongoing electricity problems and the inaccuracy of blaming wind turbines for this accident can be found here.
WHAT’S EX EXPERT?
In a statement sent to Reuters in an email, Ed Crooks, vice president of Wood Mackenzie’s U.S. division (here), said: ‘The crisis in Texas is not caused by the state’s renewable energy industry. The biggest loss of generation came from gas-fired power stations, with the delivery of wind farms a long way behind. “
However, he explained that “the loss of power was a warning to the issues that will be raised as the share of renewable energy on the network rises.” Crooks said businesses and policymakers driving the transition to green energy should pay close attention to the kind of catastrophic risks Texas faces from building resilient generating, transmitting and distributing equipment.
In an email to Reuters, Paul Goydan, a senior partner at Boston Consulting Group, which leads the firm’s energy practices in North America, said there had been “prolonged power outages because large parts of the U.S. natural gas supply were taken offline. is due to weather, and generational sources of all kinds have frozen from the extreme cold. ”
Goydan said he expects “discussions on mandatory defense” followed by “questions around natural gas storage, liquefied natural gas exports in times of crisis and the overall resilience of the energy system” as Texas plans for its future in energy.
On February 16, federal regulators said they would open an investigation into power outages in Texas and the Middle East due to extreme cold weather (here). On the same day, Governor Abbott called for the reform of ERCOT after receiving widespread criticism for not preparing for the extreme weather.
CAN INNOVATIONS WORK IN COLD WEATHER?
Benjamin Sovacool, professor of energy policy at the University of Sussex, reportedly told Newsweek that wind power in Northern Europe works very reliably in even colder temperatures, including the upper Arctic regions of Finland, Norway and Sweden. “(here)
More can be read about adapting forms for renewable energy to cold weather here, here and here.
It is important that the continued use and investment of renewable energy can slow down the effects of climate change, leading to more extreme weather patterns.
A recent fact-checking from Reuters of social media posts claiming that a helicopter, which uses fossil fuels, sprays a dishwashing detergent, manufactured with fossil fuels, is to ‘ice a wind turbine’ is available here.
VERDICT
Misleading. The use of wind turbines in Texas does not appear to be the main cause of power outages in the country amid historic cold weather. The misery of the state stems mainly from issues surrounding its independent power grid. The cold weather affected all fuels, not just renewable energy.
This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our fact-checking work here.