by Hyon K. Rah – Chair, Environment & Sustainable Development Committee

March 2021

Texas in mid-February normally makes a warm, welcome escape from the bitter cold with average temperatures of upper 40s to lower 50s Fahrenheit. It is not unheard of to be basking in 80-degree heat in Texas in the winter. What is unheard of is the kind of winter storm that struck the state around Valentine’s Day this year and drove temperatures down by over 40 degrees Fahrenheit – to below zero Fahrenheit in central and northern Texas (Figure 1). The storm brought with it a thick blanket of snow, putting every part of the state under freezing conditions for several days.

Figure 1: Below average temperatures all across the country on February 16, 2021

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/02/16/us/winter-storm-texas-power-outage-map.html

People turned to their heaters to keep warm, which led to a sudden surge in electricity demand. The electric grid struggled to keep up. In the meantime, the power infrastructure responsible for generating the electricity to meet the demand froze over – literally. Most power generators in Texas are not accustomed to cold-proofing their assets, as conditions that would require such protection are viewed as few and far between and the associated cost too high. Unlike in traditionally colder regions in the country, where generators are enclosed inside buildings to withstand the cold, power generators in Texas are left exposed to the elements; there are no regulations or incentives in place to encourage weatherizing the assets.

As a result, all types of power-generating facilities in the state, from natural gas, coal, and wind to even nuclear, stopped working. The failure of the thermal energy supply—natural gas, coal, and nuclear—has been found to be the biggest culprit for the outages. The number of homes without power peaked at four million, and, on February 23^rd, about ten days after the power outages began, over 7,000 homes were still without power.

The impact on people’s livelihoods has been grave. Over 40 people lost their lives in the crisis, unable to keep themselves warm or to stay warm without risking their safety, namely from open fires and carbon monoxide poisoning. People in already vulnerable situations, including the homeless and the hospitalized, found themselves in even more precarious situations. Those who were lucky enough to keep their heaters and lights on inside their homes were hit with astronomically high electric bills due to the highly unregulated nature of the Texas energy market.

As witnessed in previous disasters related to extreme weather, a familiar domino effect repeated itself with the failure of the water systems. Large-scale water treatment and distribution systems depend on electricity to function properly (e.g., to pump water) and the power outages caused major systems to fail. Outside of the water plants, the cold caused water pipes to freeze then burst all across the state, effectively severing people’s access to clean water. At one point, 14 million people (nearly half of Texas’ population) were placed under boil-water order, when many had no water coming out of their taps during a power outage. People were spotted melting snow and fetching river water for potable use out of desperation, which, as we have seen during other disasters, could lead to a public health disaster – on top of the one we already have.

With the weather warming up and the power starting to come back, it may be tempting to settle back into business as usual and not worry about the next cold spell, storm, or another strange weather condition to wreak havoc. Unfortunately, it is likely that more strange weather events are on the way (as discussed previously here and here) and we should only expect similar grim results if relying on the status quo that has clearly failed. Also, the water issue caused by the winter storm is going to be a longer-term problem, as the burst pipes need to be located and repaired in order to resume normal function.

In considering ways to withstand the next crazy weather event, there are two important things to note from the current crisis.

First, because Texas’ electric grid is independent from the rest of the country’s, there is no way of receiving backup power supply from outside of the state from functioning power generators. A centralized system with no backup for emergencies is hardly independent. In fact, it is extremely vulnerable (Figure 2-A). The task of updating the state-wide electric grid on a systemic level may be a daunting and costly task, but the human and monetary damage no action would cause is far greater.

Second, there are smaller-scale measures that could be adopted on single building, neighborhood, district, and municipal levels without having to wait for the state-wide system to change. For electricity, this would be the move towards a distributed system (Figure 2-C), where buildings, neighborhoods, and districts can generate their own energy from renewable sources and supply others within their network and vice versa. A similar approach can be taken with water, using a combination of water collection measures, as well as reuse and recycling. Both approaches afford people to be resilient against unexpected threats and be truly independent. In both cases, reducing unnecessary energy and water use in the first place would be a logical starting point.  

Figure 2: A is representative of the current electric grid in Texas as well as homes without backup measures for electricity and water. While B offers possible relief, C is the ideal scenario for achieving independence and resilience.

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