The power suppliers of the Electrical Reliability Board of Texas (ERCOT) and Entergy Corporation have been sued in a $ 100 million lawsuit accusing them of gross negligence in the death of a child whose family suspects he contracted hypothermia when they lost their electricity and heat. a historical cold.
The mother of 11-year-old Cristian Pineda has filed the wrongful death lawsuit in Jefferson County District Court, claiming that the utility giant has placed ‘profits on people’s well-being’ by ignoring previous recommendations to overwinter its power grid. week and left more than 4 million customers without heat and electricity as temperatures in some parts of the state dropped to one figure.
‘Despite being aware of the dire weather forecast at least a week in advance, and knowing that the system had not been prepared for more than a decade, ERCOT and Entergy could not take any preliminary action to avert the crisis. and that it was completely unprepared to face the current crisis, ”reads the lawsuit.
Cristian died Tuesday in his family’s garage in the suburb of Conroe, Houston, while sharing a bed with his 3-year-old brother under a stack of blankets in an attempt to stay warm.
The sixth learner, who migrated to the United States with his family two years ago, was a healthy boy who played in the snow for the first time in his life the day before his death, his mother, Maria Pineda, told Houston said. Chronicle.
Maria Pineda found that her son was not responding the next day and, according to the lawsuit, called 911 while trying to do CPR.
While the Pineda family claims the child froze to death, the official cause of death is pending the outcome of an autopsy, according to the Conroe police station.
Entergy issued a statement to the ABC station KTRK in Houston, saying, “We are very sad about the loss of life in our community. We can not comment due to the pending lawsuit.”
ERCOT, which manages the electrical network for more than 25 million customers, said in a statement that it had not yet reviewed the lawsuit but would “respond accordingly as soon as we do.”
“Our thoughts are with all Texans who have been and are suffering this past week,” the ERCOT statement continued.
Entergy – which supplies electricity to customers in Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi – issued a statement saying, “We can not comment due to pending litigation.”
“We are very sad about the loss of life in our community,” the utility wrote.
ERCOT officials said they began emergencies on Feb. 15 after a snowstorm covered much of Texas and dropped the temperature to below freezing. The agency said it had taken drastic action to avoid a catastrophic eclipse in the country.
“Because approximately 46% of the private generation has stumbled offline this past Monday morning, we are confident that our network operators have made the right choice to avoid a nationwide eclipse,” ERCOT said in a statement.
The lawsuit – filed on behalf of Maria Pineda and Cristian Pineda’s estate by attorney Anthony Buzbee – claims that power was turned off for ‘those most vulnerable to the cold’.
“So there were images of empty office buildings in downtown Houston with power, but the Pineda garage was left without power,” the lawsuit reads.
The lawsuit blamed ERCOT for misleading customers by assuring them the consequences would be temporary.
“The power outages instead lasted days. The failure to adequately inform the plaintiffs of the length of the suspects prevented them from properly preparing for the lack of power, or leaving the area. Accurate information has Cristian Pineda’s young life may have been saved, “the lawsuit claimed.
The Pinedas were without power and heat for two days and during that time the temperature dropped to as low as 10 degrees in their area, the lawsuit reads.
Instead of notifying customers, such as the Pinedas, that the prolonged disappearance will be extended, ERCOT sent messages on social media for customers not to do laundry on Valentine’s Day and to “fancy new appliances you get during the” bought, disconnected and used only once., “according to the lawsuit, which included an image of ERCOT’s Valentine’s Day social media message
The lawsuit also noted that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, following a severe winter storm in 2011, issued a report informing ERCOT that ‘extra wintering of power infrastructure in Texas was necessary. . ‘
A large number of units that stumbled offline or could not start during the storm in 2011 showed that ‘the generators did not wait long enough for the full impact of the long cold weather and strong winds’, according to the report released in the case is quoted.
‘Despite being aware of the dire weather forecast at least a week in advance, and knowing that the system had not been prepared for more than a decade, ERCOT and Entergy could not take any preliminary action to avert the crisis. and that it was completely unprepared to face the current crisis, ”according to the lawsuit.
Because the ERCOT system does not cross state lines, the agency is not subject to federal regulation or supervision under the lawsuit.
The recommendations were voluntary at the time, but will become mandatory by the end of next year. In an interview with KTRK last week, it appears that an ERCOT official suggested that at least some of the recommendations be followed. “In 2018, it was just as cold, just as windy, and we had very few generating plants offline,” ERCOT’s senior director of operations, Dan Woodfin, told KTRK. “It seems that the best practices and what the generators are doing in this regard are working.”
“Instead of investing in infrastructure to prepare for the well-known winter storms that would certainly leave people vulnerable without power, the providers preferred to make a profit on the well – being of people, and ERCOT allowed them to do so. , “the lawsuit said. state.