It's a HUGE state. There's opportunities for plenty of solar or wind, and I'm sure they're not opposed to some natural gas and coal to make up the difference.
It's not like it lacks wealth to pay for those things, at least as far as I know.
I know it lacks inter-state interconnects, but that can't be the sole reason.
According to Newsweek article in January: ”Texas wind farms generated nearly 120,000 gigawatt-hours of electricity in 2022, about as much as the solar output of the four next-most-prolific states combined, and 17 times more than California. The 20 gigawatt-hours (GWh) put out by Texas solar panels in 2022 took a back seat only to California's 35 GWh—but only because California vastly exceeds Texas in the number of home-roof-mounted panels, thanks to homeowner incentives that Texas doesn't offer. The electricity from Texas' solar farms already exceeds that produced by California's—and has been doubling each year for three years. "Solar costs have dropped 80 percent in the past decade," says Metzger. "The state is pouring enormous investment into it."
— https://www.newsweek.com/texas-greenest-state-energy-wind-so...
Much of TX energy infrastructure is above ground poles running along the highways. I don't know what the lifespan is of those but I wouldn't be surprised if many of them could be classified as antiques. If they aren't being regular inspected/replaced, they are likely to go down
Also, the energy companies can sell electricity to other states, and I won't be easily convinced that during this event they stopped doing that (because profits). Lastly, see previous winter event and direct recorded quotes from energy companies about how much money they were making by increased prices and I think there are several reasons why this keeps happening in TX.
It really was not long ago that “free non-polluting energy” was a thing that Republicans could get behind. Even Bush got very into biofuels, albeit going about it in the worst way possible. That party’s taken a strange turn in the last decade.
> August 25 – Hurricane Katrina moved ashore southeastern Florida as a minimal hurricane, producing a peak wind gust of 97 mph (156 km/h) at Homestead General Aviation Airport. Heavy rainfall accompanied the hurricane, peaking at 16.43 in (417 mm) in Perrine, which caused flooding in the Miami metro area. About 1.4 million people lost power during the storm. Later, when Katrina made its devastating landfall along the northern gulf coast, its large circulation produced high tides, light rainfall, and gusty winds along the western Florida panhandle. The hurricane killed 14 people across the state, and damage was estimated at $623 million.[54][55][56][57]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Florida_hurricanes_(...
Category 1 storm knocked out power for 1.4 million Floridians.
It seems "state_naturally_inefficient" social Engineering is similar always cheaper to solving problems.
Not to mention Houston is huge and dense so switching completely to underground would be a massive project that no one is going to enjoy.
Based upon press releases from Entergy[0] (north of Houston/Centerpoint) a quarter million feet of wires need to be fixed. This doesn't include transformers, logging operations, etc.
I would estimate that Houston itself (Centerpoint) is probably dealing with a million+ feet of damaged transmission lines based upon the stats up here and their reported customer outage #s.
The area I (used to?) live in wont have power until the 14th because of the damage to the distribution infrastructure.
This is 99% a game of trees falling on lines and everything cascading from there.
So that 480 miles or so is probably less than a fifth of the total repairs needed.
If you're in the Houston area and don't have power - here is a status map from CenterPoint: https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/195bcf03ae0c491f9f14bf7...
The Disconnect: Power, Politics and the Texas Blackout - https://www.npr.org/podcasts/1004840920/the-disconnect-power...
You can save money by not preparing for a 100 year storm. When there is a 100 year storm, you can make money by selling your power at a higher price.
The state needs a lot of new power lines to connect up renewables. I believe there's a huge queue of renewables projects that have money and planning permission lined up and just need their grid connection approved.
Government? Thats socialism.