Texas Grid Was ‘seconds and minutes’ From Complete Failure
February 18, 2021
As rolling blackouts began in Texas last Thursday, ERCOT officials have said the power grid was “seconds and minutes” from a complete collapse. If the grid would have gone down it could have created random, uncontrollable blackouts for months to come. This would have created an “indeterminably long” crisis, as grid operators took difficult decisions to do controlled blackouts throughout the week. Despite affecting everyone, these were necessary measures to prevent further damage.
At least 35 people have died because of the extreme weather and outages, calling for systemic changes to ERCOT, the organization whose duty is to secure the grid and ensure reliability at all moments. Additionally, there has been a lack of transparency on behalf of ERCOT.
