"For the last decade+ policy in TX and in the US has been focused on mandating or subsidizing as much wind and solar as possible.
TX has bragged about being the biggest wind generator in the US.
The TX focus on wind has come above all at the expense of coal, which has the resiliency advantage (along with nuclear) of being able to store large quantities of fuel onsite; gas mostly requires "just in time" delivery from pipelines.
"In 2009, coal-fired plants generated nearly 37 percent of the state’s electricity while wind provided about 6 percent.
Since then, three Texas coal-fired plants have closed...In the same period, our energy consumption rose by 20 percent.”
... To lessen the price increases from "unreliables" governments try to get away with as few reliable power plants online as they can get away with.
... The Public Utilities Commission of TX has called their grid's margin for error ("reserve margin") “very scary.”
Additionally, the expense and distraction of accommodating "unreliables" takes away money and focus from resiliency.
In CA this meant not maintaining power lines.
In TX it may have meant not focusing enough on making the reliable power plants resilient enough to winter weather.
... We know with 100% certainty that gas, coal, and nuclear plants can easily run in far more adverse conditions than TX has now.
And we know with 100% certainty that even if no wind turbines had frozen they would have been nearly useless during large portions of recent weather.
... the obvious lesson here is: stop subsidizing and mandating unreliables--which are often useless when you need them most--and do a better job at managing reliables.
We know how to produce enough low-cost, reliable electricity for every situation.
You just build a whole bunch of reliable power plants, including those with on-site fuel storage--such as coal and nuclear.
You place a premium on reliability and resilience.
TX is having an electricity crisis during bad winter weather because it did not focus enough on building reliable power plants and infrastructure--because it was obsessed with getting as much unreliable wind/solar electricity as possible.
Right now TX's plans include:
... As bad as TX's plans to "rely on unreliables" are, they are nothing compared to the Biden Plan, which calls for nearly 100% solar and wind electricity by 2035!
Everyone should be asking him how the hell his plan would have fared in TX this week.
... The truth about renewables and the Texas winter power shortages in two sentences:
But they are none of the solution.
Take a look at electricity use in New England, New York, the Mid-Atlantic, the Midwest, the Southwest, and Texas during this cold spell.
All tell the same story: unreliable wind and solar electricity (green and yellow) completely fail to keep us warm or powered when needed the most."