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Renewable Energy Has Saved Texas’ Grid this Summer

Rick McBride
3 min readJul 25, 2022

Even though Governor Abbott has disparaged renewables as part of the power grid

A picture of a solar array
Photo by American Public Power Association on Unsplash

What an irony that the addition of more solar arrays and wind power in oil-dominated Texas has saved the state from brownouts or rolling blackouts so far this summer. That, and the cooperation of its citizens in reducing consumption, has prevented a power grid disaster so far.

Texas’ leadership denies climate change.

Remember, Governor Abbott disparaged the windmills which were not weatherized to withstand the polar vortex that hit Texas in 2021 as the cause of the problem. But the main problem was that the state’s natural gas providers were not prepared for cold of that magnitude, according to the officials at Electric Reliability Council of Texas.

Of course, it ain’t over until it’s over.

The hottest month is still over the horizon. The dog days of August are growling threateningly. Power plants need to rest too with recovery time. They may not get the chance to do that if the heat does not abate.

It’s uncertain.

Hundreds of people died in Texas because of the power grid failure in 2021. Let’s hope we don’t have a repeat this year.

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Rick McBride
Rick McBride

Written by Rick McBride

I am a news junkie, writer, software developer, artist and dog dad. I have a wide variety of interests and have written for various media sites.

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