Let ‘Em Freeze in the Dark

Desperate for Light and Warmth, Texans See No End for Winter Storm

(NYT)

Through Chattering Teeth, Texans Criticize Extended Power Outages

(NYT)

'An electrical island': Texas has dodged federal regulation for years by having its own power grid

(USA Today)

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Behind the Scenes of February’s Texas Power Grid Disaster

(San Antonio Live!)!

Much of the rest of the United States features electricity systems that are interconnected, but Texas has long stood out for having its own grid. (NYT)

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...with electric grids damaged by frigid blasts of Arctic weather [,m]illions of Americans are without power amid dangerously cold temperatures.

The grid failures were most severe in Texas, where nearly three million customers woke up Wednesday morning facing power failures. On Tuesday, Gov. Greg Abbott called for an emergency reform of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, saying the operator of the state’s power grid “has been anything but reliable over the past 48 hours.” (NYT)

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For years, energy experts argued that the way Texas runs its electricity system invited a systematic failure. In the mid-1990s, the state decided against paying power producers to hold reserves, discarding the common practice across the United States and Canada of requiring a supply buffer of at least 15 percent beyond a typical day’s need.(NYT)

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The temperature in Houstonon Monday night — 13 degrees — was lower than that in Houston, Alaska. (NYT)

:(

Even the messes are bigger in Texas.