• Texas power prices soared 20,000% Wednesday evening amid another brutal heat wave.

  • Spot electricity prices topped $5,000 per megawatt-hour, up more than 200 times from Wednesday morning.

  • The state’s grid operator issued its second-highest energy emergency, then later said conditions returned to normal.

  • Pistcow
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    1 year ago

    As a lib, I feel so owned.

    I’m glad I live in Washington state with our cheap renewable energy.

    • Son_of_dad@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      You are kind of owned, since these red states fucking up just means that more of your tax money will go to saving these idiots from themselves through federal aid

    • chiliedogg@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Texas actually does better in the renewable energy front than you may expect.

      A quarter of the state’s energy is produced through wind and solar. The biggest bottleneck preventing more wind adoption is the capacity of transmission lines up and the lack of energy storage.

      The advantage of natural gas is that it can be dry up pretty much anywhere and isn’t dependent on weather.

      The biggest problem Texas has right now regarding energy (and housing costs, and inflation, and municipal planning, and traffic, etc) is its extremely rapid population growth.

      Yes, the heat wave is historic and ERCOT is awful, but even in perfect weather the grid is being stressed from the sheer number of people and businesses moving here

      • Rusticus@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Don’t forget natural gas lines can freeze. Remember Ted Cruz going to Cancun? Pepperidge farm remembers.

        • chiliedogg@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          While a lot of shitty things happened regarding ERCOT and that freeze (and ESPECIALLY the lack of response to prevent the next 2 freeze emergencies), Snovid was a perfect storm. And again a lot of the issues were from transmission problems when lines iced over and tress took out transmission lines.

          We’re lucky the 2023 freeze was as short as it was, because it’s impact on the grid was almost as severe even though it was shorter and not nearly as cold. It was an ice event instead of snow, and had a much larger impact on trees and therefore transmission lines. Some people were without power for 3-4 times as long as with the 2021 storm despite it being a much milder event.

          • OminousOrange@lemmy.ca
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            1 year ago

            As an engineer, critical infrastructure should very much be designed with redundancy and failsafes to prevent failure from any reasonable risk. Cold weather impacting natural gas supply is reasonable risk that can have a catastrophic impact on people’s ability to heat their homes and it’s mind blowing how those failures have happened more than once in recent years. Utilities should be held to much higher standards and immediate action taken after failures to prevent the same from happening again.

            • chiliedogg@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Completely agree. But Snovid was a case of multiple system failures. It wasn’t just gas lines freezing,. It was increased demand, frozen equipment, inoperable windmills and solar panels, trees on transmission lines, road inaccessibility for repair crews, and informational gaps.

      • Pistcow
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        1 year ago

        Ummmm they use cardboard for their new construction sheathing, new construction r value code is 30-39 compared to 49-60 for Washington.

      • lemmyvore@feddit.nl
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        1 year ago

        Texas has plenty of power. Their problem is the delivery network. Their prices surge because power can’t be delivered to everybody, not because there isn’t enough for everybody.

        • protist@mander.xyz
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          1 year ago

          I need you to explain this further? The price goes up because the demand on the grid goes up, and as the price goes up, typically additional generation comes online to take advantage of higher rates. I’m not saying it’s a good system by any means, but I don’t understand what you mean saying “power can’t be delivered to everybody”

        • SoylentBlake
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          1 year ago

          They lead the nation, iirc. Not just in the space for it, but for the actual amount that’s been implemented.

          • WalrusDragonOnABike@kbin.social
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            1 year ago

            The problem hasn’t been during the day. The supply and demand has a lag (sun comes out and its still cool and sun goes down and its still hot). The hottest part of the day has been about 6pm and then solar power starts declining before power use. That’s been when the shortages have been.

      • SeaJ
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        1 year ago

        You ever been east of the mountains? It’s going to be over 90 where my parents are today. It was over 100 for quite a bit this summer.

      • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        If you had the same amount of heat, you’d have more sunlight hours and thus better conditions for solar power. If you had more wind, wind power etc.

        There’s no scenario anywhere in the world where the entire energy consumption and more can’t be supplied via renewable sources. All that’s missing is the political will to go against the fossil fuel industry.

      • Fedizen@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        and while its not renewable and there’s a big question on how effectively its stored, nuclear power is sustainable.

    • dubble_deee@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Heard a piece of NPR about how our green grid is actually having a lot of trouble keeping up because climate change is fucking up our rainfall, and hence our hydro electric. Even if you do it right, you end up paying for the greed of everyone else.

      • Pistcow
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        1 year ago

        Texas is also the second biggest state and 3 times larger by land mass than Washington state.