More brutal cold prompts worries about Texas power grid

More brutal cold will hit Austin this coming weekend, putting much of Texas into a deep freeze.

If you lived in Texas in 2021, you remember Winter Storm Uri. It was one of the most dangerous winter storms in Texas history. ERCOT, the state’s power grid, failed, leaving many homes and businesses without heat for more than 3 days.

"Here we are four years later, the grid's not fixed and everybody's worried about the polar vortex coming next week," University of Houston Energy Fellow Ed Hirs said.

It was a scenario no one wants to relive, but could it happen again?

"As a point of reference, we have added more than 10,000MW of new generation just this year since the last winter and so we've got more supply on the grid than we ever have had before," ERCOT CEO Pablo Vegas said.

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Hirs said it isn’t enough.

"At this point in the game, demand on a winter’s night is going to exceed what can be supplied," Hirs said.

He said the grid is more fragile now than back then.

"We’ve had many more people move to Texas, a lot more business demand is growing, all the power plants are now roughly four and half years older than they were, they’re prone to breaking down," Hirs said.

Last year, FOX 7 reported several Austin Energy outages linked to problems with equipment. In April, a storm knocked down power lines. In August, a fail-safe sensor tripped because of high heat. In September, a fire broke out in a transformer.

"We never want equipment to fail. Obviously, with millions of pieces of equipment across our service territory from time to time, that will happen. What we do is we run systems checks on our circuits to make sure that everything is working properly. If there's something that appears wrong or amiss or we're getting fluctuations in performance, we go and check that out immediately to make sure that there's not something faulty there," Matt Mitchell with Austin Energy said.

Mitchell said the power plants are weatherized and crews are prepared.

"If there’s an outage, we’ve got what we need to restore that power as quickly and safely as possible," Mitchell said.

ERCOT is currently reporting normal grid conditions as of Jan. 14. You can check the grid conditions here.

Track your local forecast for the Austin area quickly with the free FOX 7 WAPP. The design gives you radar, hourly, and 7-day weather information just by scrolling. Our weather alerts will warn you early and help you stay safe during storms.

The Source: Information in this report comes from reporting by FOX 7 Austin's Meredith Aldis.

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