[1] https://www.salon.com/2021/02/17/texas-republicans-mocked-ca...
[2] https://www.yahoo.com/now/texas-governor-walks-back-fox-0524...
Many many Texans are not very envoirnmentally consciencious. It's very much a climate change disaster and many Texans felt insulated from such a global change.
To be clear shadenfreude is in poor taste but there is also a lesson for anyone who feels that climate change is other peoples problems. What is happening is awful and Texans deserve all the help the US can give.
We're #2 in the US for solar[0], #1 for wind[1], and #5 for nuclear[2] with roughly 25% of our power coming from wind alone.
Unfortunately, since weather like this doesn't occur very often (every ~60-100 years), the wind turbines aren't weatherized as they are in Canada and elsewhere. When half of that went offline on Sunday morning, it fell to natural gas to make up the difference. When the temperature continued dropping, the gas flowed more slowly and couldn't keep the right pressure levels, removing roughly a third of that production.
To be fair, your criticism would be more useful if it was built on facts.
0 - https://www.chooseenergy.com/data-center/solar-energy-produc...
1 - https://www.chooseenergy.com/data-center/wind-generation-by-...
2 - https://www.chooseenergy.com/data-center/nuclear-generation-...
It's quite bizarre to read this a day after the Texas governor literally went and blamed renewables [1] [2] when in fact their renewables have been performing better than their (far more prevalent) nonrenewables. [3]
And while frozen wind turbines have contributed to the state's energy crisis, that type of energy has only slightly underperformed against published expectations for winter output. Natural gas, the state's dominant energy source, has provided drastically less energy than expected, according to experts and industry data. "Wind was operating almost as well as expected," said Sam Newell, head of the electricity group at the Brattle Group, an energy consulting company that has advised Texas on its power grid. "It's an order of magnitude smaller" than problems with natural gas, coal and nuclear energy, he said.
[1] https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1361868404534112257
[2] https://www.yahoo.com/now/texas-governor-walks-back-fox-0524...
[3] https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/fact-check-renewable-en...
Now please re-read my comment and find where I criticized wind or any renewable.
You can say "omg a politician said something bad!" all you want but it a) ignores the data and b) doesn't lead anywhere productive.
Personally, I'll stick with the facts and data.
Please re-read mine and find where I suggested you criticized either of them?
> You can say "omg a politician said something bad!" all you want but it a) ignores the data and b) doesn't lead anywhere productive.
This wasn't just one random politician, this was the governor. Other prominent Texas politicians have also been bashing renewable energy for a long time too. Hope I don't need to find you quotes of this, but let me know if I do. How is it productive to ignore their blatant hypocrisy and let them keep spreading such awful disinformation to people? Do you really think they like to expand renewables and these quotes are just accidental gaffes others pick on? You don't see a pattern? To me it seems these officials are anti-renewables but still failing to prevent movement in that direction due to complex incentives and incomplete control.
> Personally, I'll stick with the facts and data.
You can be anti-something while still having it. Like so many people are anti-2nd-amendment but it's still there due to forces outside their control. Pointing to it doesn't imply anything about people's stances.
With regards to the governor, Texas is a little different. The Governor serves year around, according to their term but mostly applies policy and sticks within the budget that the Legislature (only serves every other year) sets. In past terms, the Legislature have expanded renewables quite successfully (as noted above) and I hope that trend will continue.
Or you can focus on "omg a politician said something bad!" but I hope I don't need to convince you that what politicians say and the policies they implement are often unrelated.
No worries, though I actually have no idea what you're referring to. The only part of your comment that I can remember replying to was that single quote from you (which is still there). The subsequent edits in my comment were just adding links & expanding on them and trying to summarize their relevant points succinctly. It must've been a misunderstanding since that wasn't the intention of anything I wrote.
> With regards to the governor, Texas is a little different. The Governor serves year around, according to their term but mostly applies policy and sticks within the budget that the Legislature (only serves every other year) sets. In past terms, the Legislature have expanded renewables quite successfully (as noted above) and I hope that trend will continue.
Great, I hope so too. Again, this means some of the vocal ones have limited control. I don't know the power (ha) vs. size of each faction, but I'm not under the impression this is happening without a fight: https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/energy/article/Tex...
Not for long. Renewables are already being blamed for this (regardless of whether it's accurate or fair) and the politically expedient thing for Texas Republicans to do, in order to to be seen doing something, is to cut funding for green energy in favor of greater investment in coal, oil and natural gas.
The various power generation approaches have different strengths, weaknesses, and risk profiles. Despite this week, it's rare to have a situation where multiple are greatly impacted at the same time.
Can someone lie and tell Texas Republicans that nuclear power is really really dirty so that they subsidize it to spite the Democrats?
also, Texas is a leader in wind power. it produces more than any other state and more than most countries.
If Texas were a country, it would rank fifth in the world: The installed wind capacity in Texas exceeds installed wind capacity in all countries but China, the United States, Germany and India. Texas produces the most wind power of any U.S. state.
I started calling the party "Soviet" way back in the Bush (or "Bushevik") era, and it's only gotten even more so since then. While the official party platform is quite different from the old USSR, the whole "the party platform dictates the facts of reality" thing is similar. I predict it will only get worse. Qanon is in the process of taking over the party.
It can have only two outcomes: the victory of an irrationalist / anti-realist Qanon party and the ensuing collapse of the country, or Democratic single party rule which may lead to the same... due to what happens when you have single party rule.
The schadenfreude I feel is at the blowback these same politicians are getting for their idiotic statements:
- Ex-mayor Tim Boyd forced into resignation after saying "if you were sitting at home in the cold because you have no power and are sitting there waiting for someone to come rescue you because your lazy is direct result of your raising!" about his constituents? Hilarious!
- Gov. Greg Abbott getting raked over the coals for blaming his failures on California? Keep it coming!
- Sen. Ted Cruz being called out for previously saying "California is now unable to perform even basic functions of civilization, like having reliable electricity"? Inject that right into my veins.
There are lots of good people in Texas. There are also lots of decent, hardworking, well-meaning politicians. I'm not enjoying these nice people having to suffer. I am very much enjoying the self-inflected suffering from the handful of visible idiots in charge.
This seems like something that would be very bad if applied to everyone. Perhaps I'd get hate for saying this in 2021, but I'd prefer a society where no one enjoys anyone else's suffering, no matter how much they dislike that person or feel that they 'deserved' it. I want a world with less suffering for everyone, not more.
Some people deserve it. He's one of them.
Politicians are elected. If the people don't approve, they have a recourse. People pile on Texas (or insert favorite punching bag of the day) because the majority (or plurality in voting) asked for these people to represent them.
A huge portion of Texans are enduring an artificial catastrophe who did not vote for any of the politicians who caused it. Although I feel bad for everyone going through it, I feel especially bad for them.
But seriously, we're pulling for you to get through this and fix the underlying issues. I don't want to see my countrymen suffering from entirely avoidable reasons!
Talk to a right leaning person and they will tell you that the rolling blackouts in California are due to the fact that the electrical grid is too dependent on renewables, and the forest fires are due to too much environmental regulation. They will probably indicate that the Texas storm was a 1 in a 100 year storm, so there was no way to plan for it, it was a black swan.
Now go talk to a left leaning person and they will tell you the Texas electric grid is too dependent on nuclear energy and de-regulation of electricity is the root cause. The storm might have affected the poorer neighborhoods, so it was yet another example of systemic racism. They will say the Texans need to stop electing people that dont believe in climate change.
Of course there is probably some truth to both, and both sides can actually have valid points, but 99% of the US doesn't seem to understand or speak with any nuance anymore - and it's a huge problem. They re-tweet, re--gram, and re-post content in fits of confirmation bias, only skimming headlines on clickbait.
Sure you can, people plan for far more rare occurrences. It costs money and will and nobody was willing to spend any. It is a tradeoff but saying you cannot plan for it is nonsense.
[1] https://www.energy.ca.gov/data-reports/energy-almanac/califo...
Texas, by contrast, has close to zero 'large hydro'. It's not clear to me that 'large hydro' is a non-renewable', certainly it's a lot different from most non-renewables, and it's not carbon dioxide producing. If you take that into account, then from (coal/natural gas/oil/nuclear) California has more like 53% of energy while Texas has 80%. That gives a little different perspective.
Compare, e.g., with this list, which includes hydro as a category of renewables: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_electri...
There is also the fact that Texas isolated itself from the national grid purposefully, which is worth reflecting on after this event.
I agree that we should move on from that to helping our fellow Americans asap however.
2. People in states who are acclimated to this kind of weather being snobby. This is annoying, but common in any scenario. I have friends who live in Alaska and I live in Chicago. Two years ago I was bitching to them about hitting -20 degrees Fahrenheit and having issues with my furnace. Their responses were jokes and screen caps of their weather history. I will say though I saw a lot of this at first, but people seem to be understanding that Texas woefully unprepared and that the dunking on them right now isn't helpful.
I don't know about "deserve", but if you don't want to get hit by lightning, don't go golfing during a thunderstorm.
Texas had a similar storm in 2011, and there was a report about what should be done: ERCOT decided to ignore it. Meanwhile, some places that are not managed by ERCOT decided to pay attention:
> El Paso is not apart of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), a major grid operator that controls about 90% of the state’s electric load. El Paso Electric, which oversee's the electricity from Hatch to Van Horn, said the Borderland is apart of the Western International grid.
[…]
> El Paso Electric said they always try to prepare for the future and after a winter storm in 2011, the utility company worked towards replacing and upgrading their equipment. Many generators now have antifreeze protection.
* https://kvia.com/news/el-paso/2021/02/15/el-pasos-not-seeing...
Meanwhile, former Texas governor (and previous Secretary of Energy) Rick Perry:
> "Rick Perry says Texans would rather be without power for days over more federal oversight"
* https://cbsaustin.com/news/local/rick-perry-says-texans-woul...
H.L. Mencken once said: Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard.
The people running the show now, and for the last few decades, in Texas is supposedly what 'the people' want (notwithstanding over suppression).
Trolls are still a thing, this is what they do
Edit: As other comments are pointing out, poor planning is not unique to Texas [1]
Of course, it’s not just Twitter that has this effect. Political commentary shows on TV and radio have been doing this professionally for decades, newspapers did it before that, and politicians probably invented the practice. I do think that social media, by drawing from such a large sample of posters, can find more extreme takes phrased in a more compelling way, and deliver them to people are weren’t event looking for political content.
When California had wildfire disasters, Trump actively impeded efforts to provide relief, and Texas politicians openly attempted to delay federal aid.
Now that the shoe is on the other foot, Biden immediately activated FEMA, and NO national Democratic politician to my knowledge is arguing that Texas should not get immediate relief. And I completely agree that Texas SHOULD get as much federal relief as possible.
But as far as hurting their feelings go? I mean, during the wildfires, Texas politicians like Ted Cruz were very happy to mock us, so what's the issue, really?
I'll go on the record and say it's fine to use Ted "it's sunny in Cancun" Cruz as a punching bag right now.
The issue is the schadenfreude regarding the people who live in Texas. Individuals have very little power over their state, and are suffering the decisions made by self-serving politicians. The country is cracking under polarization, and rather than come together as a nation, we're using this to widen the chasm. It's tragedy upon tragedy.
Ok, fair enough. What's the conservative's olive branch here? What are they doing to come together as a nation? Or is that just code for "we know we lost the election, but we want you to give us everything while we give up nothing anyway"?
The polarization and alienation worsens just as empathy becomes more and more important to facing the massive ecological problems at hand.
For example, Rick Perry, former Texas governor and Trump administration Secretary of Energy says “Texans would be without electricity for longer than three days to keep the federal government out of their business." [1] It seems to me that many Texans disagree.
I get that Republicans are theoretically in favor of small government and minimal regulation (although you wouldn't know it by the way the Federal bureaucracy has expanded under Republican presidential administrations). There is a certain sort of logic to that position, which I won't delve deeply into, but I do want to acknowledge. But, if there ever was a place for government regulation, a public utility that serves the entire state (the Texas power grid) is certainly one of them. Republicans are doing themselves no favors politically by saying things like this while millions of Texans are out of power, and basically making caricatures out of themselves.
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[0]: Just for the sake of fairness, I will mention that PG&E is not great on this front, either, but they're not the subject of this article, after all.
[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/18/rick-perry-t...
And you expect them to quietly turn the other cheek? Actually, I'm amazed at the amount of restraint I'm seeing.
Personally, if I had been Biden, I would have made every single Senator and Representative of Texas come to the White House and perform dogeza before approving the state of emergency declaration for Texas.
Of course, that's why I'm not cut out for politics.