Grim Day on the Texas Power Grid

[anorlunda]

A very newsworthy follow-up to this event is the sky high bills that Texas electric consumers faced. Numerous new sources say as high as $17000, for 3 days. That is a very important issue.

[A second follow up would be the failures of numerous municipal water systems. Certainly, water is as vital to life as electricity, and that makes it a critical infrastructure. We could add water to the discussions in this thread, or start a new thread. GE or even GD might be better than EE for this thread.]

A caveat: Since 2015, I have been arguing on PF that energy can never be intelligently discussed as a technical & engineering problem without politics and social issues. Many prominent PF members disagree strongly. Since there is a PF rule about political topics, I cannot avoid skirting the boundary of what’s allowed on PF. The words regulated and deregulated are political hot buttons, but I can't avoid using them.

4 ways to structure the electric power industry.

1. Classical Regulated Utilities – A classical utility can be public or private, but it is vertically integrated. generation-transmission-distribution-retail are all provided by a single entity that is granted a monopoly over a specified territory. Some of them even did their own construction and mining. They are allowed to profit a negotiated percentage of their investment and costs.
2. Half regulated – This is the model where generation is split off, leaving transmission-distribution-retail with a regulated classical monopoly.
3. Deregulated down to the retail level. This is the model in Texas. Providers buy power wholesale and sell it retail to consumers. Providers don’t need much more than a PC, a domain name, and an Internet connection to start their business. There are 127 of them in Texas. The former regulated utilities still have monopolies, but their business model is to collect fees for transporting energy from point A to point B. They no longer participate in the purchase or sale of energy, wholesale or retail.
4. Not regulated, no monopoly. The few places in the world that have that look like this:
   
   

Superimposed on that are other important players.

• Regulators. In the USA, every state has a PUC (Public Utilities Commission). We also have FERC, the federal regulator with jurisdiction everywhere except Texas. The PUC that I'm most familiar with has 400 lawyers, but only one engineer in their staff.
• NERC (North America Electric Reliability Corporation). This is a voluntary group that sets standards for electric power companies. AFAIK, everyone in North America follows NERC standards, whether or not mandated by regulation. Compare NERC to UL for electric appliances, or NFPA for fire safety, or ISO for diverse standards.
• The grid operator. In most places, an independent organization such as ERCOT, PJM, MSIO, NYISO, NEPOOL, CAISO, ... sits above the utilities and generators to operate the grid.
  
  One of the conclusions after the 1965 NE blackout (which started my engineering career) was that power companies were too small to operate the grid securely. Regional level control was needed. The first one was the New York Power Pool (today called NYISO).
  
  Since 2000, the independent operators also took on the job of running the markets for electric energy and services, analogous to how the Chicago Board of Trade runs commodity markets. FERC regulations mandate independent grid operators, so they result from regulation, not deregulation.

Now, back to the events of this month. Texas uses model #3, mandated by a 2002 law. The $17000 electric bills are a consequence of model #3. Commodity prices set by public auction are intrinsically volatile. Past attempts to set ceilings on the prices have always failed. New York actually has a law forbidding the ISO from considering price when purchasing power critically needed to keep the lights on. Customers in other countries such as Sweden have also be harmed by model #3.

Texas consumers are lured by advertisements such as this:

Proponents of model #3 argue that it keeps profits in the community rather than big nameless, faceless, corporate fat cats, and hated public utilities.

I favor model #2. In that model, only power companies and big industrials participate in the volatile wholesale market. Retail prices are set by negotiations between the PUC and the regulated utilities, and typically stay fixed for 1-2 years. I believe that retail customer can never be adequately educated about the risks of model #3, and the significance of price spikes that happen only 0.6% of the time. Therefore, IMO model #3 should never be used.

 

[jedishrfu]

A personal note on this storm, I've lived through many extreme storms in NY where the power was out for days where it was so bad we kids/teens longed for school. There was only so many things you could do at home like read a book you've read before (we didn't buy books and not read them that would be wasteful) or better read comics and draw stuff or play board games (no internet) or fight with your siblings over nothing or go outside and brave the snow, ice and cold knowing that there was no heat when you got back inside.

As an adult I lived through a few ice storms in Poughkeepsie where the October leaves had yet to fall but during the great ice storm big branches took out the power, telephone and cable lines and blocked the roads and yes still no internet, no cell phone, no telephone, no electricity and no cable. But the kids had fun and the ice on the trees was magical in the moonlight and day too.

I have to say though that this storm in Austin was an order worse than those storms of the past. The bitter cold for days killed our plants outside and in the garage where we kept the more precious ones. I imagine too that our bugs are goners and that we'll have a nice summer although it would have been nice to average out the heat and cold across the year. I don't know about the birds whom we saw just a day before the storm hit.

We didn't lose electricity but the hardest part was the loss of water and having to melt snow on the stove (took too long for normal melt) to for toilet flushes. We also had to scramble for groceries even though we had prepared beforehand as the HEB market was stripped clean. On the bright side got to play with our granddaughter for several days now.

Some folks were so concerned about losing tree branches that they propped them up with 8ft lumber with swimming noodles attached to warn people not to run into them while walking on the sidewalk. I had to go around and trim some branches to reduce the load on the tree. Another family nearby spent the days creating an ice castle/igloo out of the snow pack and some colored sand which promptly melted away.

Can't wait for the next one!

 

[nsaspook]

A very newsworthy follow-up to this event is the sky high bills that Texas electric consumers faced. Numerous new sources say as high as $17000, for 3 days. That is a very important issue.
...

Talked to my mom in Texas that never lost power, she pays a typical fixed-rate plan like most people so her bill will not increase. It's a news story that as usual leaves out important facts to make a sexy story. Only the few (from a pool of millions that didn't) that signed up to pay wholesale prices might see a change in the bills due to wholesale price spikes. A few, voluntarily, in the state of Texas, took chances to play the wholesale price game and lost.

https://apnews.com/article/texas-high-electric-bills-explained-aa77ff97be48bf2c8fabfdc2e4a6d08c

 

[jedishrfu]

Talked to my mom in Texas that never lost power, she pays a typical fixed-rate plan like most people so her bill will not increase. It's a news story that as usual leaves out important facts to make a sexy story. Only the few (from a pool of millions that didn't) that signed up to pay wholesale prices might see a change in the bills due to wholesale price spikes. A few, voluntarily, in the state of Texas, took chances to play the wholesale price game and lost.

https://apnews.com/article/texas-high-electric-bills-explained-aa77ff97be48bf2c8fabfdc2e4a6d08c

Yes, but this was advertised to all Texas consumers and many trying to save on electrical bills went for it. Texas is a state that values personal freedom to the extreme.

You can own a gun, carry it anywhere unless there's a prohibition posted. It may be concealed or open depending on the license and you can shoot yourself in the foot but you'll need to pay your own medical bills if you do and maybe tell the police why you did it.

What kind of state is that?

 

[nsaspook]

Yes, but this was advertised to all Texas consumers and many trying to save on electrical bills went for it. Texas is a state that values personal freedom to the extreme.

You can own a gun, carry it anywhere unless there's a prohibition posted. It may be concealed or open depending on the license and you can shoot yourself in the foot but you'll need to pay your own medical bills if you do and maybe tell the police why you did it.

What kind of state is that?

Sounds like New Hampshire.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_New_Hampshire

 

[anorlunda]

A few, voluntarily, in the state of Texas, took chances to play the wholesale price game and lost.

That article is about Griddy, one of the 127 provieders. I can foretell the jokes already -- no Griddy but Greedy.

You can own a gun, carry it anywhere unless there's a prohibition posted.

It's the same in Vermont. You have to be 16 to carry, but 21 to buy a gun in VT.
On my first day in Vermont, I saw a headline, "First murder in Vermont in 3 Years."

 

[jedishrfu]

We should stay on topic because being a featured thread means all the Greg’s (future governor @Greg Bernhardt and current governor Greg Abbott) of the world will be watching it

 

[Astronuc]

Vistra Corp., one of the largest power generators in Texas, said it warned state agencies days before cascading blackouts plunged millions into darkness that internal forecasts showed electricity demand was expected to exceed supply.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...kouts-one-texas-power-giant-sounded-the-alarm

Same article on Yahoo if one cannot access Bloomberg
https://news.yahoo.com/days-blackouts-one-texas-power-014130098.html

 

[Astronuc]

As an adult I lived through a few ice storms in Poughkeepsie where the October leaves had yet to fall but during the great ice storm big branches took out the power, telephone and cable lines and blocked the roads and yes still no internet, no cell phone, no telephone, no electricity and no cable. But the kids had fun and the ice on the trees was magical in the moonlight and day too.

I can relate to that.
https://www.newyorkupstate.com/weat...ms_in_the_northeast_in_the_past_60_years.html

That list of 25 worst storms is weakest (25th) to strongest (1st), with 1st at the bottom.
The first was the Blizzard or Superstorm of 1993.

My wife was stranded with 2 ft of snow and two kids. On Friday, March 12, 1993, I was trying to get home from New Orleans, where it was snowing. My colleagues and I checked in at the airport and went to get dinner. After dinner, we walked to the concourse and discovered all flights going east were canceled (I probably should have taken a flight to Houston and grabbed a redeye to NY City, but this was before electronic tickets and online reservations). We had a connection in Charlotte. So we rebooked for the next morning, then checked into a hotel for the night.

Next day, March 13, we caught our flight and got to Charlotte. We changed planes and headed to LGA. We we 15 minutes from landing (1.5 hrs after leaving CLT) when the pilot was informed that LGA had closed due to heavy snow, so we turned around and flew back to CLT. After we landed in CLT, one of went to check on hotels, while the rest went to check flights. No flights, so we got a taxi and headed to the La Quinta near CLT. We go there and the power was out. We checked in by flashlight and paper. Next thing was getting dinner - Waffle House was the only thing open (that block was the only block with power), and fortunately in walking distance. We ate dinner and went back to the hotel. Power came on again in the morning. We had two choices for breakfast, lunch and dinner: Waffle House and Cracker Barrell. YeeeeHaaah. We didn't leave CLT until Monday, March 15. The flight got to LGA, finally, and we parked on the tarmac for about 45 minutes waiting for a gait. I got to my car and drove home.

New York City and suburbs weren't too bad, but by the time I got up near home, what was normally a two lane stretch of parkway (four lanes with a wide median) was a narrow one lane road with high embankments of snow on either side. I got home and found the driveway plowed - and a lot of snow in the yard. There had been 24 inches of snow (that weekend) on top of the 18 inches that had accumulated though the previous weekend.

My wife told me - don't ever do that again! My folks had planned to visit, but they were stranded in Boston.

 

[mfb]

You can own a gun, carry it anywhere unless there's a prohibition posted. It may be concealed or open depending on the license and you can shoot yourself in the foot but you'll need to pay your own medical bills if you do and maybe tell the police why you did it.

What kind of state is that?

One that shot itself into the foot figuratively with its electricity grid.

 

[nsaspook]

https://www.accuweather.com/en/winter-weather/dallas-sees-80-plus-degree-temp-swing-in-just-1-week/905385

The temperature in Dallas bottomed out at 2 below zero on Feb 16. With the high temperature soaring to 80 on Feb. 23, Dallas is looking at a big temperature swing of 83 degrees exactly a week later.

Oklahoma City also came in with an 86-degree temperature swing by Tuesday afternoon as the temperature soared to 71 degrees. In Oklahoma City, the mercury plunged to 14 degrees below zero last Tuesday.

 

[nsaspook]

One week later.
https://www.google.com/search?q=Tex...XCJzQIHaXbCigQ_AUoA3oECBAQBQ&biw=1920&bih=880

 

[PeroK]

One week later.
https://www.google.com/search?q=Tex...XCJzQIHaXbCigQ_AUoA3oECBAQBQ&biw=1920&bih=880

View attachment 278547

Is that a Ted Cruz re-election campaign tee-shirt?

 

[Astronuc]

A wide cast of characters throughout Texas’s lightly regulated power sector appear to have failed to heed experts’ long-standing warnings, notably in the wake of a similar series of outages almost exactly a decade ago. In February 2011, an ice storm struck the state, crippling power plants and forcing rolling blackouts. After that disaster, lawmakers and regulators studied how the state’s electric and natural-gas infrastructure needed to be shored up, as in other states, to withstand punishingly deep and extended winter freezes. Key recommendations from various experts were to require winterizing of power-generating equipment and fuel-delivery infrastructure such as gas pipelines, and to provide for https://www.brattle.com/news-and-knowledge/news/brattle-consultants-present-options-to-public-utility-commission-of-texas-for-changes-to-ercot-market-design that would be needed when demand surged or when some providers went offline. Both moves would impose somewhat higher costs and result in marginally higher electric rates. But they might have averted the much higher costs Texans now face for business disruption, broken pipes, flooding, and spiking electric bills—not to mention human suffering and death.

https://www.texasmonthly.com/politics/texas-blackout-preventable/

Power supplies became so scarce that what were supposed to be rolling blackouts ended up lasting for days at a time, leaving millions of Texans without lights, heat and, eventually without water. Even the Ercot control center lost water, and had to bring in portable toilets for its staff. It's just catastrophic, said Tony Clark, a former commissioner with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and a senior adviser at law firm Wilkinson Barker Knauer LLP. By Friday, when Ercot declared that the emergency had ended, 14.4 million people still lacked reliable access to public water supplies, and the crisis had already cost the state $50 billion in damages, according to Accuweather.

. . . some generators made a windfall as energy prices soared to $9,000 a megawatt-hour during the crisis. In all, generators have earned more than $44.6 billion in electricity sales alone this year more than 2018-2020 combined, according to Wood Mackenzie. Those earnings don't take into account any hedges that may have been in place. In the wake of the blackouts, the Public Utility Commission of Texas announced an investigation into the factors that led to the disaster.

Hell may not freeze over, but history suggests that Texas’s energy system does—and with some frequency. In 1989, in 2003, and in 2011, the state experienced, to varying degrees, simultaneous shutdowns of power plants and parts of its natural gas–producing infrastructure, as significant swaths of both of those critical systems were incapacitated by arctic temperatures, triggering blackouts.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-02-20/texas-blackout-how-the-electrical-grid-failed

I don't know about the veracity of the claim of $50 billion in damages, but I suppose that will come out from any investigation into the causes of the Texas blackouts, root causes and effects/consequences.

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Four board leaders of Texas’ embattled power grid operator said Tuesday they will resign following outrage over more than 4 million customers losing power during a deadly winter freeze last week.

All of the board directors stepping down, including Chairwoman Sally Talberg, live outside of Texas, which only intensified criticism of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas.

The resignations are effective Wednesday, a day before Texas lawmakers are set to begin hearings over the outages in the state Capitol. The board members acknowledged “concerns about out-of-state board leadership” in a letter to grid members and the state’s Public Utility Commission, which oversees ERCOT.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/board-leaders-of-texas-grid-operator-resign-after-outages

 

[Office_Shredder]

Surely you should count the piles of money the generators made as damage to the general texas economy, which that 50 billion is probably not doing?

 

[mfb]

$50 billion could have bought a few additional power plants as backup and tons of work to make the infrastructure more cold-resistant.
We'll see how much money will be used to prevent a repetition of this.

 

[jedishrfu]

Just saw this article on the ERCOT meeting where it was shown that Texas nearly became a dark state for months:

https://www.nbcdfw.com/investigatio...ackout-that-could-have-lasted-months/2562592/

The video talks briefly about the catastrophe that was 4 mins away but not exactly what it was. They mentioned it could have paralysed cell towers making a really big mess with communications down. But at least we have horses, right?

UPDATE: WSJ has a writeup on the 4 min crisis:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/texas-...lapse-during-freeze-operator-says-11614202063

And this article on the deregulated market in Texas where many consumers were forced into deregulated plans:

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-...tricity-market-raised-cost-to-consumers-by-28

No more hay for the horses.

 

[jedishrfu]

More details from our local station KUT:

https://www.kut.org/energy-environm...ds-away-from-collapsing-heres-how-it-happened

Basically, the frequency dropped and if it did too much then cascading shutdowns would occur, equipment damaged and the whole mess would be really hard to untangle after that.

I recall some commentary on the NY/Canada Great Northeast Blackout of 1965 where some radio stations noticed their records were sounding a little flat and a little slow:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_blackout_of_1965

Radio
An aircheck[4] of New York City radio station WABC from November 9, 1965 reveals disc jockey Dan Ingram doing a segment of his afternoon drive time show, during which he noted that a record he was playing (Jonathan King's "Everyone's Gone to the Moon") sounded slow, as did the subsequent jingles played during a commercial break. Ingram quipped that the King record "was in the key of R." The station's music playback equipment used AC motors whose speed was dependent on the frequency of the powerline, normally 60 Hz. Comparisons of segments of the hit songs played at the time of the broadcast, minutes before the blackout happened, in this aircheck, as compared to the same song recordings played at normal speed reveal that approximately six minutes before blackout the line frequency was 56 Hz, and just two minutes before the blackout that frequency dropped to 51 Hz.[5] As Si Zentner's recording of "(Up a) Lazy River" plays in the background – again at a slower-than-normal tempo – Ingram mentions that the lights in the studio are dimming, then suggests that the electricity itself is slowing down, adding, "I didn't know that could happen". When the station's Action Central News report comes on at 5:25 pm ET, the staff remains oblivious to the impending blackout. The lead story is still Roger Allen LaPorte's self-immolation at United Nations Headquarters earlier that day to protest American military involvement in the Vietnam War; a taped sound bite with the attending physician plays noticeably slower and lower than usual. The newscast gradually fizzles out as power is lost by the time newscaster Bill Rice starts delivering the second story about New Jersey Senator Clifford P. Case's comments on his home state's recent gubernatorial election.

 

[chemisttree]

When the frequency dropped early Monday morning, my power went out and stayed off for 2.5 days. I ran my backup generator nearly nonstop for that time. I thought that was a long time to be off! When I checked my transformer on Wed., I found this...

Notice that dangling “fuse” from the ceramic insulator? It’s supposed to be like this...

 

[chemisttree]

You don’t see snow on the roof subliming in the early morning sun like this very often in central Texas!

 

[chemisttree]

Just saw this article on the ERCOT meeting where it was shown that Texas nearly became a dark state for months:

https://www.nbcdfw.com/investigatio...ackout-that-could-have-lasted-months/2562592/

The video talks briefly about the catastrophe that was 4 mins away but not exactly what it was. They mentioned it could have paralysed cell towers making a really big mess with communications down.

The article mentioned the AC frequency dropped to 59.3 hz. Bad stuff happens when the frequency drops out like that.

My deer had plenty to eat!

 

[mfb]

in this [1965] aircheck, as compared to the same song recordings played at normal speed reveal that approximately six minutes before blackout the line frequency was 56 Hz, and just two minutes before the blackout that frequency dropped to 51 Hz.

That's crazy.

Here is the Texas grid frequency. The maximal drop was 0.7 Hz, but the frequency recovered within minutes.
Here is the largest incident in Western Europe (from 2006). The frequency dropped from 50 Hz to 49 Hz for a few minutes. Normal variations are below 0.2 Hz.

 

[jedishrfu]

Another grim story of the great Texas ice storm, a letter from an Austin paramedic:

https://www.kxan.com/news/local/aus...ers-share-experiences-battling-winter-storms/

I'm sure @berkeman can relate to this.

Go, First Responders!

 

[anorlunda]

In the aftermath of last week's events, there has been a flurry of discussions here on PF and elsewhere. For example, from today's Wall Street Journal:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/grid-r...ut-at-what-cost-11614335401?mod=hp_lead_pos12
Grid Reliability Is Feasible, but at What Cost?
Everybody can agree that electricity grids should be more reliable. It will be much harder to agree on what price to pay for that safety.

The climate is changing. Does that mean that we should harden every place on Earth against freezing? drought? fire? tornados? hurricanes?

Tornados left, Hurricane tracks right

Should we harden businesses against pandemics? I see that Disney was hit harder by COVID than airlines, and is demanding the same government bail-out as airlines or General Motors.

Should we protect innocent people from loss of income?

Personally, I worry more about financial instabilities in the electric sector brought on climate and social shifts. I discussed that ( https://www.physicsforums.com/insights/renewable-energy-meets-power-grid-operations/ ). But I also believe that society's resources are better spent on teaching itself how to withstand calamities with little injury rather than trying to prevent them. I discussed that ( https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/staged-blackouts.922146/ ). Hardly anybody agreed with me on that.

The list is endless, and the answers about "what price to pay" are few. We might stand a better chance at making rational policy if we had had one big money pool for "risk aversion" rather than a budget line item for every specific risk that someone imagines.

Who can answer the question, "What percent of my income should I spend on risk aversion?" If you personalize it, rather than imagining "someone else pays the bill", we have a better chance for rational answers.

 

[jedishrfu]

I wonder if a distributed approach would be better as in everyone connected to the grid and owning a storage battery and possibly solar panels. It would be like the days when computing was shared between machines as in the Great Prime search or the Protein Folding screen savers.

But I guess it would come down to maintenance by individuals and that doesn't always work out well.

 

[Averagesupernova]

I discussed that ( https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/staged-blackouts.922146/ ). Hardly anybody agreed with me on that.

Thanks for the memory. Lol. I hope you didn't take my disagreement too personally. In the other thread on this latest Texas issue, I had said some folks only learn the hard way. Of course that comment was political/philosophical in nature, but it generally extends to people's readiness.
-
So it's a tough question about what is to be spent to prevent what happened in Texas from occurring again. First of all, it looks to me as a general infrastructure failure, not just electrical utility. Personally I don't care one iota about Texas. But, like with most things, it doesn't end there. I need to care since, for one, Texas is a source of a fair amount of this country's natural gas. None of us are as independent as we like to think. What happens in Texas can and did affect the rest of us. So we can either accept a similar repeat in a few years with likely wider consequences, or do something about it.
-
On the bright side, maybe this latest issue will make folks think about being more prepared. At least for a while.

 

[Oldman too]

Some one needs to discuss https://acore.org/heartland-power-outages/ and macro-grids with https://www.ercot.com/... Things aren't going to improve in the long term anytime soon.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/texas-power-outage-storm-climate-change/

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/30/climate/polar-vortex-weather-climate-change.html

 

[jedishrfu]

Recent VOX video on the Texas Grid disaster and how it could be a harbinger of things to come for the rest of the US:

 

[sophiecentaur]

Who can answer the question, "What percent of my income should I spend on risk aversion?" If you personalize it, rather than imagining "someone else pays the bill", we have a better chance for rational answers.

A good point and it brings up the choice between Big Government and Small Government. People cannot be relied on to make the best long term decisions - because they are not experts and tend to be only concerned by their taxes (in the short term). In places where there are frequent power cuts, the wealthy can often insulate themselves against them. Such places will often have Small Government.
Energy supply reliability - public health care - public education and infrastructure in general will only be good where suitable (uncorrupt) leaders are prepared to make choices which are often contrary to what the general populace would choose. This may not be a topic that PF encourages discussion about but this thread is totally to do with politics. Mending the roof when the Sun is shining.

 

[Dr.D]

People cannot be relied on to make the best long term decisions - because they are not experts and tend to be only concerned by their taxes (in the short term).

Socialism, anyone?? I think I'd rather be free, even free to make bad choices.