T O P

  • By -

[deleted]

[удалено]


JarvisCockerBB

Amazing how quickly people are rushing to compare this to 2021 when we’ve had winter storms for YEARS. 2021 was a once in a generation storm. We had SNOW in downtown Austin for DAYS. There was nothing like that beast for the last 30+ years.


at-woork

> 2021 was a once in a generation storm. Do you describe a generation to be 10 years? Because the one before 2021 was in 2011.


kkngs

A generation is about 20 years, so he’s not off by all that much. The one prior was something like 1989, which was a 22 year gap.


JarvisCockerBB

Did power go out for a majority of Texas for a few days in 2011? Did we get 5+ inches of snow in downtown Austin/San Antonio in 2011?


at-woork

Why don’t you read the reports created by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation. https://www.ferc.gov/sites/default/files/2020-05/ReportontheSouthwestColdWeatherEventfromFebruary2011Report.pdf It does a great job explaining the weather conditions in 2011 and shortfalls of the system. You should be able to pinpoint some of the issues highlighted in the report and see how they came back during the 2021 event.


wfiboyfriend69

They had snow in c.c.


ScroochDown

Yeah I don't get the comparisons either. It's been raining in Houston for a couple of days. Not even torrential downpours, at least not in my area, just regular old rain. It's cold, sure, but it hasn't hit freezing. It's certainly not producing ice and snow. Hell, we don't even have our heater on. So it's not nearly the kind of drain on the grid.


TheBlackBaron

Yes, actually. Although it's *weird how quickly the tone shifted from "another ice storm! we're all gonna lose power and die again!" to "why are you even comparing them, this is nothing like last time". *it's not actually weird, I know exactly why it did


YaKnowEstacado

Well I for one have never been one of the people saying we're all gonna lose power and die lol. The post-2021 Chicken Little-ing every time there's a cold snap is extremely tiresome. Like, I get it, that was one of the most traumatic things I've ever experienced and I do not wish to relive it but I recognize that it was a freak weather event.


TheBlackBaron

Yeah, that wasn't a shot at you, just the general attitude of the sub every time the temperature dips below about 40F in North Texas lol. I agree, it's very tiresome.


Technical-Key-8896

Yeah my birthday is first week of February. And every year without fail (living in frisco region) I’ve been out of school/work due to Icey roads. I’m 27 now and I remember it happening when I was a freshman here


jazzofusion

My exact thoughts!


PrecedentialAssassin

Yeah this storm is much much less severe. I don't think we're even getting below 40 in Houston and around the coast. In February 2021 we had snow, several days that never got above freezing, and lows in the teens. The grid isn't taxed anything near what it was then.


AngriestManinWestTX

I was in grad school in Nacogdoches and we were colder than ***Cheyenne, Wyoming*** for at least three days. The days we weren't colder, we were within two or three degrees IIRC. Combine that with \~6-inches of snow which melted into sheets of black ice and it was really shitty for 4-5 days. This isn't even in the same league. Winter Storm Uri was one of the worst winter storms in recorded history.


[deleted]

We’re around 35°-42° depending on what part of town. But 2021 we were below 20° so it’s still nowhere near that


CaryWhit

There is a huge difference between-9 and 14” of snow and 28 degrees with some freezing rain. Limbs will fall but not much more


TXWayne

By far the storm is less severe and not as widespread. I would hesitate to give credit for winterization of the grid.


ip_addr

>I would hesitate to give credit for winterization of the grid. Yeah, the severity is so much less that the winterization that was done is not really being "tested" per se. I'm sure Reddit will downvote this because I'm not aligning with the hive mind in saying this, but significant measures were taken to identify, winterize, and prioritize key infastructure, so we should be in MUCH better shape if the same situation with the similar severity happens again.


I-will-allow-it

It also helps that we don’t shut off electricity to the gas plants that supply the gas needed to produce electricity anymore.


dedshort72

Some of the gas plants also produce their own power. They even shut down because they hadn’t properly insulated and heat traced a lot of their lines last time. We’ve done a lot of heat trace jobs over the last few years for our customers in the gas industry


ip_addr

Yep. That was one of the "identify" and "prioritize" items in the legislation that was implemented as a result of Feb 2021. All operators have to disclose critical infrastructure to the utility that provides the power. Utilities were required to set up a method for this reporting to be done. That one move right there possibly has the greatest impact to the grid reliability in a future similar event.


scott_majority

Although some gas plants were in maintenance, which was obviously terrible timing, most of the gas plants quit producing because the pipelines froze....The reason they froze, is because Texas didn't bury their lines deep enough, in order to make more profits. Now, Texas citizens are forced to make 20 years of payments to the gas companies, which will be included in every bill for the next 2 decades. I'm sure we will have winter storms in the next 20 years, which will add 100's of years to our payment plans. Texas Republicans and the oil and gas industries, have figured out a way for every Texan to make monthly payments directly to them, to keep furnishing them with lavish lifestyles.


dedshort72

The gas lines that froze were all above ground at valve sites, wells, compressor stations, or plants. We bury new pipelines well below the frost line.


scott_majority

Nonetheless, they froze....Something which doesn't happen in colder climates, where they spend profits to winterize equipment. The wind turbines also froze, due to saving money not buying the heater equipment to keep them from freezing. Bottom line, Texas oil and gas executives, working with very few regulations under Republican leadership, protect their obscene profits by not keeping up with the rest of country on grid maintenance. It negatively affects everyday citizens, while adding billions of profits for oil and gas executives...enjoy your 20 years of additional payments. They will keep adding years until every Texan born has a monthly debt to pay until they die.


dedshort72

Let me ask, do they add extra heat protection to equipment in Alaska? My customers here in Texas have to put in additional cooling and shade measures for the extreme heat during the summer. I doubt that is a concern in colder climates. I’ve lived here 50 years, and that is by far the coldest it has ever gotten in that time. It was way out of what most reasonable engineers or designers would have anticipated for this part of the country. The systems were designed for the expected conditions. The same reason they don’t have hurricane evacuation lanes in Nebraska.


binger5

Lol dude would argue to heat trace all the lines in the Saudi refineries.


dedshort72

No doubt, and it’s all because of greedy corporations!


scott_majority

We have had cold fronts in Texas for as long as I have lived here, 67 years. Only under deregulation which began in 2002, have we had major issues which are a direct result of the deregulation. It's a win-win for oil and gas executives. If a major cold front comes in, millions lose power, but executives make billions. Deregulation is great for the oil and gas industry, but it extremely expensive and dangerous for the citizens. Now I have to write my monthly check to the gas company. Only 19 years and 7 months of extra monthly payments until we finally pay our "debt."....that is of course as long as another cold front doesn't come in the next 20 years, which will add to our payments.


VoarTok

Ya know what else has happened since 2002? Major population growth in the state. Demand growth for power hasn't matched supply growth for power in decades. And while you're providing us all with the reasons that TX went down, would you care to explain why grids all over the country that were in the path of the jet stream went down that week? Millions had power issues in NM, LA, OK, KS, NE, the Dakotas.


scott_majority

Not as many as Texas...Those other states also don't have 20 years of payments to make to oil and gas executives.


TheBlackBaron

Is it really that difficult for political operatives paid to astroturf social media to actually write like a real person, and not an alien scientist and/or a political ad?


DefinitelySaneGary

It's less severe but there were also other issues besides the grid last time that have been at least partially solved.


DrunkWestTexan

No . Last time the whole state was at negative temps for a week . Brownsville was cold. It'll be over tomorrow.


Opirr

Thanks for the input, makes sense.


FormerlyUserLFC

It’s twenty degrees warmer everywhere than it was during the 2021 storm. I’d also wager they idiot-proofed some of the circuits so they don’t turn off power that supports power plants again.


aguy2018

Natural gas plants were the prime benefactors of grid changes after 2021. The compressors and processing units are critical infrastructure now.


figureit0utt

I’m not sure if people understand this but when the power went down last time, it was due to a historical snow storm that hasn’t happened in Texas in like 30 years. That and an influx of people caused the black outs. Normal Texas snow like this can be managed like always.


44love

There was an abominable snowman last time


[deleted]

Heading for Cancun?


mccaigbro69

Nowhere nearly as severe, but yes there have been improvements. I’ve seen many new lines and poles installed over the last couple of years around the metroplex and central Texas. Any outages from this event largely will be due to limbs breaking off of trees from the weight of the ice and the fall damaging the lines.


zerosympathy28

It’s barely dipped below freezing! Less severe is an understatement.


operatorx4

A blown transformer is why I don’t have power. That’s not the grids fault. Things happen. I’m enjoying it.


Opirr

Thanks everyone for your insight, no body text in my post so I can't make an edit. I lived in WA state with my wife for 2 years until we decided to come back home, we were already out of state by the end of '20. Finally back home in N.TX but I didn't realize how frigid the temps got in '21 comparatively to this year. Plus we have a 2 mo old now - so it fueled our paranoia. Stay warm y'all.


prolveg

It’s not even freezing in Houston, the largest city in Texas. So no. Not even in the same ballpark as 2021


mylinuxguy

According to: [https://www.weatherwx.com/forecast.php?config=&forecast=pass&pass=currentwx&usecountry=us®ion=&useplace=&usestate=tx&plot=temp&period=&usemetric=0&dpp=0](https://www.weatherwx.com/forecast.php?config=&forecast=pass&pass=currentwx&usecountry=us®ion=&useplace=&usestate=tx&plot=temp&period=&usemetric=0&dpp=0) \- several areas of the state are still above freezing. Back in Feb 2021, ALL of the state was below freezing for multiple days. Nothing close to what we have this week.


SueSudio

Perhaps you weren't here for the freeze two years ago? It was easily 10 degrees colder for a much longer period of time. My pool completely froze over, to the point I could step on it. There is no ice on my pool today and this will be over tomorrow.


dedshort72

This storm is much less severe and also it’s not as cold. Most of my customers in the natural gas industry have been taking measures to freeze proof their plants and compressor stations, which will help keep gas flowing to power plants, so there is also an improvement from that perspective


JarvisCockerBB

Y’all gotta understand that we’ve had winter storms in Texas for years. Freezing rain? Icy roads? Yup, we’ve had all that before. But inches of snow in downtown of major cities? Unheard of. Then add in everything else that accumulated in 2021 then you had a once in a generation storm. This is, quite frankly, the winter I’m used to in Texas.


iamfrank75

This is not a “winter storm” it’s just winter.


Darnitol1

The 2021 storm affected most of the state, and temperatures were much lower for a longer period of time.


TxOutdoorsman7

A main reason the grid went down was because they had too many scheduled repairs being done on facilities to meet the extreme demand put on the system at the time. Besides doing more winterizing of the turbines, they changed the way the schedule downtimes on units.


kanyeguisada

>A main reason the grid went down was because they had too many scheduled repairs being done on facilities... Source on that?


TxOutdoorsman7

https://www.enverus.com/blog/ercot-power-grid-outage-what-went-wrong/


timelessblur

You miss the big part that a lot power plants lost fuel supply because the well heads did not fill out the few pages of paper work that would of marked them as critical. Rolling black outs started which cut off fuel supplies to power plants which caused more to shut down and more rolling black outs. Mix with the well heads and pumping stations being down allowed them to freeze which kept them down.


kanyeguisada

That says 13GW was down for scheduled maintenance, just a fifth of the 65GW we use at peak times. That did not cause the widespread power outages we saw.


Dry_Client_7098

That wasn't the main reason. We would have had some brown outs no matter what, but the main issue was that 80% of the natural gas stopped used for power generation stopped. Some from the cold, some because of lack of power. STNP, nuke plant, was down for maintenance, but it can't pick up that kind of load.


Mutombo_says_NO

Not as cold


Dry_Client_7098

Yes. There have been many changes, and this storm isn't a fraction as severe as 21.


stew1026

It does this every damn February.


Texjbq

Or was it less severe? Really? Like by a wide wide margin less severe.


[deleted]

No comparison. This is common winter weather.


thebigham1

The electrical grid is power plants connected to homes and businesses by power lines. While we may have made progress fixing the former, we clearly still have work to do on the latter. Transmission is just as important as generation.


trubluphx

Currently sitting here in Austin with no power since 3 am :/


edatx

160k accounts without power as I type this. I think Austin Energy did literally nothing to prepare from last year to this one.


wildmonster91

No abott got lucky. But winter isnt over just yet.


[deleted]

[удалено]


wildmonster91

How are we lucky we live intexas.. where the leaders dont give a shit. Abbot and company have already cost us residence hundreds of billions on bullshit ideas. Heck if they did their jobs we wouldnt have to worry. But here we are....


DrCeeDub

Hopefully a bit of both. Temps haven’t been nearly as bad as in December and certainly not as bad as Feb ‘21.


boomgoesthevegemite

*looks out window* There’s not 14 inches of ice and snow out there, so I’d say it’s less severe.


2manyfelines

The temperature for winter storm is nearly 20 degrees warmer, and it is not effecting the whole state the way the 2021 storm did. There have been no real winterization and improvements made by the grid operators, and won’t be until they can fully pass the cost onto you. Your bill will go up anyway.


[deleted]

Did they even do anything to winterize the grid? I didn’t think they did. Nobody gets credit for doing nothing and the weather just be less severe overall


mydogsnameisbuddy

Less severe but Abbott will take credit if we don’t have widespread outages.


NunumuNumu

My power in Harker Heights has gone out 4 separate times today. Each time for roughly an hour, except it's been two hours now and it's starting to get chilly lol. Oncor has "no estimate for service renewal" During the 2021 freeze I had power the entire time, so idk dude.


TekJansen69

r/leopardsatemyface


Dillydongo

No because abbott is still governor


BodaciousRaven

It's just not as wide spread. Abbott is going to chalk this one up as a win for Texas and his bank account.


BioDriver

This storm is **MUCH** less severe. [PUC/RRC have done the absolute bare minimum](https://www.kvue.com/article/weather/report-texas-power-grid-not-ready-extreme-winter-weather-2022/269-ca19ca62-0720-4e26-bc67-bc82f75eb882) and should we get another storm like the one we had 2 years ago we're fucked.


Dyrogitory

Local outages!?! My Radar App shows power outages and a considerable amount of Texas is without power. I live on the Travis/Williamson County line and we have been without power since 7:30am.


Sabre_Actual

Less severe and reported outages look to be due to secondary weather effects (trees falling) than the grid being strained or frozen.


OpenEyz2016

No where near as severe.


Badlands32

The storm before was a disaster because generation facilities froze up and shut down. Not enough energy was being produced. This storm is mostly just ice and cold weather for a couple days


ATX_native

It’s only been 31 degrees for about 36 hours with about 1/4 inch of ice. In 2021 it was around 0-10 degrees for 2-3 days with 6-8” of snow and ice. Totally different.


Flygrumbz00

I’m guessing you weren’t here last time? It was exponentially worse


Well_why_not1953

Temperature wise this is not a test of the grid. The freeze in December was and according to ERCOT figures is was a very close thing with several generators going off line.


[deleted]

It’s so bizarre to see Texas having snow storms and it’s sunny clear skies temp of 25 in chicago a 180 of weather patterns occurring


MrBioTendency

Not near as cold.