[Redlands Okie]

Around here our oaks hickories and poplars can grow 81 to 120.5 feet tall. And if you cut them back to the stump within the right of way, and run the skidders and helicopters with the boom cutters up the edges of the right away, ice loads or wind loads will pull trees away from the line, because the center of gravity will favor that side. Maintained right of ways perform much better than unmaintained ones. Sure you will have people fight the utility companies over spraying and cutting trees, but let them freeze to death a few times and they will stop that.

“but let them freeze to death a few times and they will stop that.”



I think I might know some people like that. Amazing how many times it takes some people to learning a lesson

 

[wr]

The mess of the Texas grid is not new - it is a long ignored problem.

56 percent of Texas' energy comes from natural gas, just under 24 percent comes from wind, 19 percent from coal, and almost 9 percent from nuclear energy.

The US is the biggest producer of natural gas in the world and Texas the star state for production. Because of this climate crisis the all the production of electricity failed including that supplied by natural gas. Canada is right now sending huge amounts of natural gas to Texas and other states and sending more electricity to the eastern seaboard from Quebec and Ontario. Could this be a more ridiculous situation for Texas? We are going to have even worse storms in the future with bitter cold. Wind turbines and natural gas plants do not fail in Canada, other cold countries and even in many US states because the increased use of electricity with more population and the reality of climate change has been acknowledged and the grid has been expanded, strengthened, protected and especially winterized.

How much money would you suggest Texas invest in winterizing facilities? Is your AC set up and ready in case you have a freak heatwave tomorrow?

Do you share your wisdom with Quebec every time they have an ice storm and need military assistance or their propane supply becomes dangerously low or is that only reserved for those you feel are special?

 

[Redlands Okie]

We lost electric for some time in this area not to long ago. Mostly as a result of lost electric from ice and tree damage. Between friends and customers in all electric homes I heard a bit about being prepared for the next time. Not seen much change as I finally get to some of them that could wait for the cosmetic repair part of the jobs. Thankfully this last weather issue was just cold and some snow.

It will be interesting to see if the Texas utilities do much to prepare for the next cold spell. Same for the population. I highly suspect their will be some talk, a bit of high profile action. And then not much else. Human nature being what it is. Hopefully I am wrong.

 

[Nevada]

It will be interesting to see if the Texas utilities do much to prepare for the next cold spell. Same for the population. I highly suspect their will be some talk, a bit of high profile action. And then not much else. Human nature being what it is. Hopefully I am wrong.

Cooperating with the national grid won't cost that much and will go a long way towards stabilizing their utilities.

 

[Redlands Okie]

Cooperating with the national grid won't cost that much and will go a long way towards stabilizing their utilities.

Apparently Texas thinks it will cost them a lot to tie into the national grid. From what I read its not the dollars. It’s the regulations and politics from the various corporations , states, and Washington that is the problem. So far what they have has worked pretty well, until this last cold snap.. Lots of examples of long term ongoing problems elsewhere in the nation served by the national grid. Cities with millions of people, large sections of states doing without electric on a regular basis. The more I read the more I realize lots going on behind the scenes that makes one wonder about the whole electric situation.

 

[barnbilder]

Cooperating with the national grid won't cost that much and will go a long way towards stabilizing their utilities.

Wrong again. Cooperating with the national grid means California will have power and the Texans that produce it will still run out.

 

[Alice In TX/MO]

Both states’ systems failed.

Texas and California built different power grids, but neither stood up to climate change

The winter storm that crippled Texas this week and heat wave the hit California last summer show much more needs to be done to protect power supplies from extreme weather.

www.politico.com

 

[Nevada]

Wrong again. Cooperating with the national grid means California will have power and the Texans that produce it will still run out.

Interestingly, Texas is situated between the eastern US gris and the western grid. So if Texas wanted to cooperate with it's right-leaning neighbors to the east, that could be done. That would leave California completely out of the picture.

 

[emdeengee]

How much money would you suggest Texas invest in winterizing facilities? Is your AC set up and ready in case you have a freak heatwave tomorrow?

Do you share your wisdom with Quebec every time they have an ice storm and need military assistance or their propane supply becomes dangerously low or is that only reserved for those you feel are special?

Quebec and Ontario has had a lot of assistance from the government and military when there have been natural disasters including ice storms, hurricanes and floods. Ditto for Newfoundland and the Atlantic provinces. Oh and also Alberta which has had many natural disasters (floods, fires, tornadoes, snow and ice storms) and is constantly having to be bailed out. Canada (as you should know) is used to winter weather and not hesitant to spend what is necessary to upgrade and move with the changes. More needs to be done of course but there are always political hindrances. I do have a lot of friends and family in Quebec and Ontario and we do share our wisdom on how to prepare for natural disasters and also how to cope with the stress of insurance companies.

We have air conditioning in our car but not yet in the house as thus far we have not needed it but will in the near future as our summers are definitely heating up .

Our heating system was assessed in 2020 and we know we have to change within the next two years so have already booked for a whole new energy efficient system which will include air conditioning so we will have it when needed. It is always best to plan ahead and make the changes before they are needed. Something that Texas did not do which is really tragic but people do learn from their mistakes so hopefully Texans will go after their governments and businesses to fix all these problems.

 

[wr]

Quebec and Ontario has had a lot of assistance from the government and military when there have been natural disasters including ice storms, hurricanes and floods. Ditto for Newfoundland and the Atlantic provinces. Oh and also Alberta which has had many natural disasters (floods, fires, tornadoes, snow and ice storms) and is constantly having to be bailed out. Canada (as you should know) is used to winter weather and not hesitant to spend what is necessary to upgrade and move with the changes. More needs to be done of course but there are always political hindrances. I do have a lot of friends and family in Quebec and Ontario and we do share our wisdom on how to prepare for natural disasters and also how to cope with the stress of insurance companies.

We have air conditioning in our car but not yet in the house as thus far we have not needed it but will in the near future as our summers are definitely heating up .

Our heating system was assessed in 2020 and we know we have to change within the next two years so have already booked for a whole new energy efficient system which will include air conditioning so we will have it when needed. It is always best to plan ahead and make the changes before they are needed. Something that Texas did not do which is really tragic but people do learn from their mistakes so hopefully Texans will go after their governments and businesses to fix all these problems.

I'm sure you don't tell friends in Eastern Canada that they get what they deserve but

We keep things current too but that doesn't ensure that problems won't arise. We lost power at -45C at about 1:00 am. I can assure you that all our preparations meant very little when one simple failure left everything from our well house on through frozen solid in a matter or mere hours.

My nearly antique gas stove kept things fairly comfortable but under those circumstances, there is a very narrow window where important decisions have to be made. I know what needs to be done and how quickly decisions need to be made but that's because I'm familiar with my environment.

Those who are unfamiliar are going to struggle.

 

[The Paw]

I'm sure you don't tell friends in Eastern Canada that they get what they deserve but

We keep things current too but that doesn't ensure that problems won't arise. We lost power at -45C at about 1:00 am. I can assure you that all our preparations meant very little when one simple failure left everything from our well house on through frozen solid in a matter or mere hours.

My nearly antique gas stove kept things fairly comfortable but under those circumstances, there is a very narrow window where important decisions have to be made. I know what needs to be done and how quickly decisions need to be made but that's because I'm familiar with my environment.

Those who are unfamiliar are going to struggle.

I think it's really important to distinguish between the readiness of households, and the readiness of utilities/infrastructure. You can only expect so much from families, only some of whom have the experience or knowledge. But there is really no excuse for utilities to be under-prepared.

I had power outages when we lived in the country, and I've had water supply freeze as well. Fortunately, because the grid itself was properly maintained, the shortages were usually only a few hours. And once the electricity is back on, it becomes a whole lot easier to deal with the prospect of thawing out water lines, etc.

It's not that breakdowns never occur, its about having systems with enough resiliency to rebound from an extreme event.

 

[no really]

Climate of Texas - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

This was an unprecedented weather event. Check the average temperatures for Texas, in the link above.

 

[Nevada]

I heard somewhere that Texas used to be it's own country. Why did we change that?

 

[no really]

I heard somewhere that Texas used to be it's own country. Why did we change that?

For the ports, natural resources and large areas of farm and ranch lands. By the way who is we?

 

[Nevada]

For the ports, natural resources and large areas of farm and ranch lands.

We didn't know at the time that Ted Cruz was part of the deal.

 

[no really]

We didn't know at the time that Ted Cruz was part of the deal.

Who is we?

 

[wr]

I think it's really important to distinguish between the readiness of households, and the readiness of utilities/infrastructure. You can only expect so much from families, only some of whom have the experience or knowledge. But there is really no excuse for utilities to be under-prepared.

I had power outages when we lived in the country, and I've had water supply freeze as well. Fortunately, because the grid itself was properly maintained, the shortages were usually only a few hours. And once the electricity is back on, it becomes a whole lot easier to deal with the prospect of thawing out water lines, etc.

It's not that breakdowns never occur, its about having systems with enough resiliency to rebound from an extreme event.

I think it's really important to distinguish between the readiness of households, and the readiness of utilities/infrastructure. You can only expect so much from families, only some of whom have the experience or knowledge. But there is really no excuse for utilities to be under-prepared.

I had power outages when we lived in the country, and I've had water supply freeze as well. Fortunately, because the grid itself was properly maintained, the shortages were usually only a few hours. And once the electricity is back on, it becomes a whole lot easier to deal with the prospect of thawing out water lines, etc.

It's not that breakdowns never occur, its about having systems with enough resiliency to rebound from an extreme event.

I think both work under similar principles. Locally and individually, we tend to focus on logical and expected situations and try hard not to sneer at those who experience something unexpected.

Alberta has had a major flood a few years ago and while changes were made, I don't think anybody, other than the expected few, spent a great deal of time focusing on the fact that we weren't overly prepared for something that happened never before.

I would expect to see changes in how Texas operates but I can't see a whole lot of point standing around pointing fingers at individual aspects of a whole system.

With a little research and conversation with a friend in Texas, I can't find anything suggesting this was something that's ever fallen apart like this so I question the narrative that Texas should have known this was going to happen.

 

[GTX63]

We didn't know at the time that Ted Cruz was part of the deal.

Who is it you are speaking for?

 

[GunMonkeyIntl]

We didn't know at the time that Ted Cruz was part of the deal.

Really?
You just can’t help yourself, can you?

 

[The Paw]

I think both work under similar principles. Locally and individually, we tend to focus on logical and expected situations and try hard not to sneer at those who experience something unexpected.

Alberta has had a major flood a few years ago and while changes were made, I don't think anybody, other than the expected few, spent a great deal of time focusing on the fact that we weren't overly prepared for something that happened never before.

I would expect to see changes in how Texas operates but I can't see a whole lot of point standing around pointing fingers at individual aspects of a whole system.

With a little research and conversation with a friend in Texas, I can't find anything suggesting this was something that's ever fallen apart like this so I question the narrative that Texas should have known this was going to happen.

People who are paid to manage and regulate power utilities are paid to plan for eventualities like this. I don't hold individual families to the same standard, they don't have the resources to necessarily anticipate once-in-a-century events, but the professionals do. There were lots of people in the energy industry who were predicting Texas was vulnerable because of their choice to purse low regulation, low price energy.

How a Winter Storm Tested Texas’ Go-It-Alone Attitude

Texans have long prided themselves on bucking federal oversight and standing apart from the rest of the country. But this week revealed the risk that comes with that independence.

www.politico.com

The proof is in the pudding. The parts of Texas that are connected to the Eastern and Western US grids did not experience catastrophic failure. And the article I am linking indicates that about 10 years ago there was a major winter storm that knocked out much of the grid, but Texas blew off the concerns of federal regulators who lacked jurisdiction.
Refusal to heed warnings is not the same thing as "no one could have predicted this..."