Four directors of ERCOT resigned. details in link. Later A 5th out-of-state board member, Vanessa Anesetti-Parra, resigned in a separate letter. The remaining board members reside in Texas. The link to her resignation was on Twitter. ERCOT is a 501 c4 organizatio which as I understand it cannot be procecuted because it holds sovereign immunity and as a 501c does not pay taxes either. We are still waiting for the legislature to investigate. https://www.texastribune.org/2021/02…-resign-texas/
Edit to add link to sovereign immunity
"Panda Power filed suit in 2016 against ERCOT, alleging the grid operator issued “seriously flawed or rigged” energy demand projections that prompted the Dallas power company to invest $2.2 billion to build three power plants early last decade. The plants ended up losing billions of dollars, with one forced into bankruptcy.
ERCOT’s reports calling for more power generators came in the aftermath of a major ice storm in February 2011, which crippled Texas power plants and forced rolling blackouts across the state.
I don’t know, but I don’t think that them making such a recommendation would absolve them of blame. Context will matter.
Having worked in the corporate world for a while, I’m quite certain everything has been suggested and recommended and cautioned against in meetings over time. There’s always a bullet on a slide or a email or a report that says that X should be done to prevent Y bad outcome.
If ERCOT had a laundry list of recommendations and winterization was at the bottom of a long list or mentioned twice in comparison to other priorities being pushed hard hundreds of times, then that’s just as bad as not ever mentioning it. Doing a bare minimum CYA is not a get out of jail card.
They are responsible for managing this, therefore knowing and not doing, or compelling to be done, is worse than not knowing.
I don’t think they’re resigning over winterization in particular. I’m sure they all know about or participated in schemes ranging from scandalous to illegal. They need to git out while the gittin’ is good.
According to the Houston Chronicle Previously Panda Power sued ERCOT
Panda Power filed suit in 2016 against ERCOT, alleging the grid operator issued “seriously flawed or rigged” energy demand projections that prompted the Dallas power company to invest and in response to ERCOT spent $2.2 billion to build three power plants early last decade." Because in 2011 winter storms resulting in blackouts.
"ERCOT’s reports calling for more power generators came in the aftermath of a major ice storm in February 2011, which crippled Texas power plants and forced rolling blackouts across the state.
The Panda Power lawsuit alleged:
Panda Power, the grid operator issued “seriously flawed or rigged”. The case was never decided because of the Sovereign Immunity status of ERCOT:.
“Panda Power’s case was halted in 2018 when an appeals court in Dallas asserted ERCOT was protected from lawsuits by sovereign immunity.”
The reason we know that is because of the 11 year old child who died in this year’s storm when the attorney filed suit which brought up the Panda Power lawsuit remember they brought online 3 more power generatoring plants because of the previous findings in 2011.
I’m just relating the information I receive. My thought is if ERCOT was held accountable and were transparent when purchasing enough energy for the predicted storm in advance, prior notice of the severity and length of the storm. tERCOT would not have had to resort to the drastic cut back in “existing power grid” to the customers which caused manty deaths and económic loss.
I’m no electrical expert, but since Texas isn’t on the same grid as the rest of the lower 48, how could they “purchase enough energy” in advance of the storm?
"ERCOT, however, is an energy-only market. There are no pure capacity payments in ERCOT. To survive in ERCOT, grid-scale energy storage systems must either buy energy low and sell energy high or provide ancillary services, which are essentially operating reserves that respond to variability in load or in generation output, often for purposes of voltage and frequency control.
To date, the energy arbitrage and ancillary services use cases have not been attractive enough for storage truly to flourish in ERCOT. Currently there are just 10 operational standalone storage projects in ERCOT with a total capacity of 101 megawatts, of which 64 megawatts are from two projects. According to ERCOT, these existing storage projects are primarily used for ancillary services."
I don’t live in Texas nor do I work in the energy sector. But from what I have read in the news there are 3 actors in this play: the power companies, ERCOT, and the state legislature. The power companies can’t run, they are just going to have to take the beating and move on. But they also can’t be replaced. The state needs their power. A few CEOs might find it important to spend more time with their families, but other than that, not much can be done to them. The state legislature is the source of political power here and answerable to the voters. They are going to be looking for someone else to blame. That leaves…
If I were on the ERCOT board I would resign to. Doesn’t matter what they did or didn’t do, the powers that be are looking for a scapegoat and there is only one entity available.
You can if you’re connected to a continental system and there are parts of North America that have surplus capacity.
If you have clear indications that you will need more power because of extremely cold weather, you can potentially buy energy for future delivery that will be produced in another region that either will not be affected by the storm, or will have surplus energy to sell during the storm.
Of course, that doesn’t work if you want to be free of fédéral régulations and so aren’t connected to the continental grid.
‘The Grid’ as used here is a concept. Texas is not physically disconnected from all other power sources. They don’t participate in balancing the use of power in the eastern and western portions of ‘The Grid’ and thus when they are in trouble the rest of the country is not going to just start turning on the juice for them. This is the way they wanted it.
You elected those GOP Governors, etc. Maybe you didnt vote for them yourself, but they were elected.
What I am tired of is the fact several ERCOT directors got death threats. It is time for the FBI to get involved whenever a death threat comes in and make arrests. I dont care what side makes them.
Actually, it mostly is. You can’t physically connect AC grids without that sort of coordination, or very bad things will happen. There are a few DC interties, but they don’t have very much power capacity.
The grids are not all connected either in that sense either. They can and are now providing power to the Texas grid. Just because the ‘switch’ is in the off position doesn’t mean they are disconnected in the sense I mean. They didn’t have to build towers and run wires across some gorge to provide power to Texas.
Conversely, just because they are ‘connected’ doesn’t mean they can power Texas. A tie has a given power capacity, and you don’t build more capacity than you think will be required.
Texas is a major power user. There just isn’t enough power around to power Texas from outside, and that isn’t going to happen. There isn’t cheaper power available outside Texas, and that isn’t going to happen either.
Texas doesn’t sell power, and part of the reason is so that Texas can avoid transparency, regulatory oversight, and stability and reliability requirements imposed by being part of a larger community.
There is a major trade-off in the power supply industry between price and reliability. I wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that Texas was feather-bedding it’s power supply industry, protected by isolation, and I’m not surprised by suggestions that it was price-cutting, protected by isolationism. It’s not something for which there is one simple correct answer.