The Greening of the Grid Froze Texas

Guest Post by Tom Luongo

Polar winds scream out of Canada in seeming revenge for Joe Biden canceling the Keystone XL pipeline.

Texas’ power grid collapsed as temperatures more likely in Sioux Falls than San Antonio roared in plunging more than 4 million people into darkness and without heat.

How can this have possibly happened in a place whose entire cultural identity revolves around producing energy?

Simple.

Texas’ deregulated energy market went green over the past decade. In the past ten years, according to the EIA, Texas retired more than 5,000 MW of coal-supplied power while spinning up more than that in windmills.

Wind produces the marginal, or last, megawatt in Texas, in this case the last 17%. Nuclear provides the first megawatt, less than 10%.

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