Agree 100%. Right now I think we have a market / regulation problem more than anything. Pricing both dispatched and non-dispatched on marginal rate doesn't make sense. That being said, right now to me the "team" with egg on its face is gas. The whole point of gas is that you can scale and ramp it as needed. Doesn't do any good if 1) you don't have enough gas 2) infrastructure can't handle cold to get the gas to you 3) plants aren't weatherized

But, we've enjoyed very very low power prices for a long time now because of it. I bet most would be willing to pay a few cents per kwh more in hindsight if it meant not dealing with this..but that isn't how markets work. Same reason most of us don't have backup generators.

gonemaroon said:

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From that point / what I am saying is they knew they had to cut load they knew they were going to do it and then they didn't do it on time and when they needed to. Instead they sat there and watched the **** hit the fan beyond a point of repair. This is what happened / they are going to try to blow smoke up everyone's ass.

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While you are spot on accurate on what should have happened, do not underestimate the amount of political pressure Abbott was putting on them to not shed load. Instead of wanting to address the issues, I know the pressure he put on the PUCT going into summer 2018 and forward to not have any rolling brownouts was immense.

Zobel said:

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Agree 100%. Right now I think we have a market / regulation problem more than anything. Pricing both dispatched and non-dispatched on marginal rate doesn't make sense. That being said, right now to me the "team" with egg on its face is gas. The whole point of gas is that you can scale and ramp it as needed. Doesn't do any good if 1) you don't have enough gas 2) infrastructure can't handle cold to get the gas to you 3) plants aren't weatherized

But, we've enjoyed very very low power prices for a long time now because of it. I bet most would be willing to pay a few cents per kwh more in hindsight if it meant not dealing with this..but that isn't how markets work. Same reason most of us don't have backup generators.

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But, isn't part of the reason more infrastructure/investment wasn'd made in gas, because wind is so subsidized? If for instance Tesla is paid $40K subsidies to build electric cars (false), could you blame Ford for not investing more heavily in updating/modernizing the Explorer?

Small gas turbines sitting idle most of the time, waiting for a surge to be dispatched/put into gear in a crisis, are the least likely to get extra cold weather maintenance/investments, regardless of the ownership.

Agree with you 100%.

Zobel said:

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Agree 100%. Right now I think we have a market / regulation problem more than anything. Pricing both dispatched and non-dispatched on marginal rate doesn't make sense. That being said, right now to me the "team" with egg on its face is gas. The whole point of gas is that you can scale and ramp it as needed. Doesn't do any good if 1) you don't have enough gas 2) infrastructure can't handle cold to get the gas to you 3) plants aren't weatherized

But, we've enjoyed very very low power prices for a long time now because of it. I bet most would be willing to pay a few cents per kwh more in hindsight if it meant not dealing with this..but that isn't how markets work. Same reason most of us don't have backup generators.

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Agreed. It's a matter of priority and maybe a few board members and a handful of top execs were around at all in '89, but they haven't had to plan for this, so they didn't. "Team gas" has the expertise within the industry to keep this from happening on their end and they (and coal) blew it, "team wind" isn't playing by the same rules, but they did make it harder for everyone else to get the resources and attention they need to manage priorities apart from "green".

I'll be looking into an LP conversion for my backup generator.

Zobel said:

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Because it's freaking cold

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I still don't understand.
It's cold so there isn't any power.
No lines are down like in years past where it took weeks in some cases to get them repa.
It's cold so large areas are without power for 12,24,36 hours plus? It's winter time of course it gets cold.
I have been reading threads all morning and I still don't understand why.

No, wind increases the variability of the net load which means the grid gets more volatile. That's a great match for gas turbines, small ones especially. Nationwide gas turbines are running more than they were ten years ago, not less. GT Capacity factors have gone from 30% to near 50% over the past ten years or so.

The loser from wind is coal.

flyingaggie12 said:

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water plants now starting to go down due to lack of power (ft. worth)...what happens to that infrastructure if water can't be moved?

reports saying cell phone towers could start going offline after running out of fuel if on generator

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It's happened in brownwood.

Zobel said:

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No, wind increases the variability of the net load which means the grid gets more volatile. That's a great match for gas turbines, small ones especially. Nationwide gas turbines are running more than they were ten years ago, not less. GT Capacity factors have gone from 30% to near 50% over the past ten years or so.

The loser from wind is coal.

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Agree, but will add another loser: GT maintenance.

Broken or frozen pipes. Frozen instruments. Iced up sensors. Frozen valves. Frozen coal conveyor belts. Iced up vents or air inlet screens or ducts. It gets cold in winter but it almost never gets *this* cold here.

All the same crap were fighting in our homes right now are same issues in plants. And they likely didn't have enough manpower on site to deal with it, travel difficulties, etc etc.

And who knows most plants rely on the grid to start, they aren't black start. Once they trip off it may be a challenge getting them back up.

Tell me about it. Our GT repairs sales have dropped. But the other driver behind that is 32k hour combustion parts and turbines that can run a full hot gas path with no maintenance. Customer approach to maintaining their GTs has totally changed in the past ten years.

nortex97 said:

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Zobel said:

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Agree 100%. Right now I think we have a market / regulation problem more than anything. Pricing both dispatched and non-dispatched on marginal rate doesn't make sense. That being said, right now to me the "team" with egg on its face is gas. The whole point of gas is that you can scale and ramp it as needed. Doesn't do any good if 1) you don't have enough gas 2) infrastructure can't handle cold to get the gas to you 3) plants aren't weatherized

But, we've enjoyed very very low power prices for a long time now because of it. I bet most would be willing to pay a few cents per kwh more in hindsight if it meant not dealing with this..but that isn't how markets work. Same reason most of us don't have backup generators.

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But, isn't part of the reason more infrastructure/investment wasn'd made in gas, because wind is so subsidized? If for instance Tesla is paid $40K subsidies to build electric cars (false), could you blame Ford for not investing more heavily in updating/modernizing the Explorer?

Small gas turbines sitting idle most of the time, waiting for a surge to be dispatched/put into gear in a crisis, are the least likely to get extra cold weather maintenance/investments, regardless of the ownership.

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It's a matter of priority. Whoever managed facility design for the plants knocked out by the cold made the decision not to spend extra money to account for a high need, but infrequent, event like this.

The impact of wind/renewables is indirect. In your Ford/Tesla example, think about Ford trying to get regulatory approval, raise money, and hire good management to deal with ICE engine reliability when the government attention, capital markets cash and talent pipeline are all getting scooped up by Tesla. After a generation of this, Ford begins to believe that no one actually cares, until they need it.

This part is key.

If PUC knew...
and ERCOT knew...you would think that they did inform the governor and all others.

Why didn't they tell the public to take down consumption over the weekend? Heck on Friday?!?!?!


We have to remember this event..and ensure that we, as Texans, have better people in charge in case of a disaster. As I told my daughter last night, this is literally like a hurricane hit the entire state of Texas...except in subzero cold.

And now, for all the talk us Texans talk, the MSM is making a mockery of us. We talk tough, but we won't be tough to hold those in office accountable.

We deserve better.

And it's not new. Same thing happened in 2011 and 2014. Wind penetration doesn't seem to matter in that regard. Companies aren't going to spend significant capex for infrequent events.

Zobel said:

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Tell me about it. Our GT repairs sales have dropped. But the other driver behind that is 32k hour combustion parts and turbines that can run a full hot gas path with no maintenance. Customer approach to maintaining their GTs has totally changed in the past ten years.

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Ours too. New part sales in the crapper, it's all about limping along with garbage hardware.

Charpie said:

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This part is key.

If PUC knew...
and ERCOT knew...you would think that they did inform the governor and all others.

Why didn't they tell the public to take down consumption over the weekend? Heck on Friday?!?!?!

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Saying this makes the public is the scapegoat, they can turn your power off when needed, but they failed to do so in an orderly fashion. This isn't like the one day in summer a year when we need to just squeeze off a couple % at the top.

The public won't be the scapegoat when they didn't even know there was a problem.

Zobel said:

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No, wind increases the variability of the net load which means the grid gets more volatile. That's a great match for gas turbines, small ones especially. Nationwide gas turbines are running more than they were ten years ago, not less. GT Capacity factors have gone from 30% to near 50% over the past ten years or so.

The loser from wind is coal.

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This is why we need a coherent strategy in stable sources of base load power. Like we used to have with Coal and Nukes. We also need more simple cycle peaker plants, which require the rate base to pay standby costs. I am fine with renewables but the wind doesn't always blow, the sun doesn't always shine and the water doesn't always flow. There are many reasons we are where we are right now. But from a macro perspective it is because of a lack of coherent energy strategy that is diversified and redundant. We can pass the blame all around but ultimately it resides with us in applying pressure until it is too late. Hopefully some good comes from this and the greenie's STFU and let the knowledgable adults define the strategy of which renewables is a part.

Counterpoint to that - we have plenty of simple cycle peakers and more than enough power 99.9% of the time. We run into a squeeze about once every 3-4 years.

The grid is "fine" for normal. It's not fine for cold. The root of this is equipment unprepared to operate in freezing conditions. We are at 60% of previous max generation, and we have coal, nuke, wind, and gas all offline for cold.

The market does not incentivize preparedness... I mean I guess if you were a GT peaker or something who was not locked in for power and invested in weatherization you're making out like a bandit today. IF you have gas, which doesn't seem like a sure thing at all.

Zobel said:

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Counterpoint to that - we have plenty of simple cycle peakers and more than enough power 99.9% of the time. We run into a squeeze about once every 3-4 years.

The grid is "fine" for normal. It's not fine for cold. The root of this is equipment unprepared to operate in freezing conditions. We are at 60% of previous max generation, and we have coal, nuke, wind, and gas all offline for cold.

The market does not incentivize preparedness... I mean I guess if you were a GT peaker or something who was not locked in for power and invested in weatherization you're making out like a bandit today. IF you have gas, which doesn't seem like a sure thing at all.

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Expecting the market to take an action that might only kick in a few times over the life of a plant during the time of the season its likely going to be down for maintenance anyways is asking for a disaster. And we got it. The government has to step in and force these sorts of actions.

Zobel said:

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And it's not new. Same thing happened in 2011 and 2014. Wind penetration doesn't seem to matter in that regard. Companies aren't going to spend significant capex for infrequent events.

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Not unless they are properly incentivized to do so with both the carrot and the stick. But this requires monthly power bills to increase a little and too many political figures are too stuck on saying what a wonderful free market we have in Texas. I'm not saying going back to full regulation is the answer but some is needed for certain industries.

Plants aren't normally down for maintenance in winter. Outages are in spring and fall.

The market is doing want people want / demand - cheap power, as cheap as possible on average. Side effect is infrequent events like this.

Zobel said:

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Plants aren't normally down for maintenance in winter. Outages are in spring and fall.

The market is doing want people want / demand - cheap power, as cheap as possible on average. Side effect is infrequent events like this.

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And this is very much a failure of the free market.

sodycracker said:

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^ exactly! Subsidize the 'green' producers & demonize the real producers and this is what happens. Pathetic

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Edit for arrow pointing to free market statement

Zobel said:

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That's an idiotic statement.

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Maybe you didn't see the poster's name (or you aren't familiar with him,) but he tends to make a lot of those.

MisterScott said:

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Zobel said:

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No, wind increases the variability of the net load which means the grid gets more volatile. That's a great match for gas turbines, small ones especially. Nationwide gas turbines are running more than they were ten years ago, not less. GT Capacity factors have gone from 30% to near 50% over the past ten years or so.

The loser from wind is coal.

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This is why we need a coherent strategy in stable sources of base load power. Like we used to have with Coal and Nukes. We also need more simple cycle peaker plants, which require the rate base to pay standby costs. I am fine with renewables but the wind doesn't always blow, the sun doesn't always shine and the water doesn't always flow. There are many reasons we are where we are right now. But from a macro perspective it is because of a lack of coherent energy strategy that is diversified and redundant. We can pass the blame all around but ultimately it resides with us in applying pressure until it is too late. Hopefully some good comes from this and the greenie's STFU and let the knowledgable adults define the strategy of which renewables is a part.

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Logically, we should remove all wind subsidies, and also require infrequent/unreliable/time of day dependent sources to pay for service/maintenance costs for standby power. That would kill all solar/wind sources, yes, but it would be an important step forward/eliminate this insanity.

Zobel said:

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Counterpoint to that - we have plenty of simple cycle peakers and more than enough power 99.9% of the time. We run into a squeeze about once every 3-4 years.

The grid is "fine" for normal. It's not fine for cold. The root of this is equipment unprepared to operate in freezing conditions. We are at 60% of previous max generation, and we have coal, nuke, wind, and gas all offline for cold.

The market does not incentivize preparedness... I mean I guess if you were a GT peaker or something who was not locked in for power and invested in weatherization you're making out like a bandit today. IF you have gas, which doesn't seem like a sure thing at all.

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This type of thing is precisely what deregulation and open power markets were supposed to keep from happening, problem was, it was only ever half deregulated and you have stupid incentives (see Enron western power crisis) and payment for ethereal benefits that pay real cash (green credits) while everyone sits and waits for a day that comes only occasionally. It's just crowded out of the strategy.

Hypothetically, you could have a fleet of maintained standby generation of whatever kind that fits on a semi truck and facilities to plug them into the grid and deliver at market price, but you can't. This type of thing is expensive, and it only pays for itself when the market has a real problem and wants to pay more. If you show up and effectively tell people, "I can power your house/city for the next week for $500/$5,000,000", they'll call you a "price gouger" and you'll be the villain, but that opportunity is the only thing that kept your generators serviceable.

Otherwise, you raise rates to the point that everyone pays way more all the time to eliminate a situation where someone can raise his price to pay for a more expensive specialty arrangement.

I see an opportunity for doing this on a micro level now that we have everyone's attention. A big full LP tank and standby generator seems like a better investment than whatever else someone was going to spend $20k to upgrade in their house.

Zobel said:

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The grid is "fine" for normal. It's not fine for cold. The root of this is equipment unprepared to operate in freezing conditions. We are at 60% of previous max generation, and we have coal, nuke, wind, and gas all offline for cold.

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I know the free market means less regulation, but wouldn't it be feasible to require power generation to be capable of operating to a minimum temp? I know it doesn't happen "often", but it seems like we can all talk about 2-3 times where freezing weather has caused issues with the grid.

Or change the pricing/structure so that you are penalized if you can't operate down to a specific temp? So you don't have to pay to weatherize, but if you can't produce, you get stuck paying for your down time? Only if temps drop below zero (or a pre-defined number), are you "excused" of your fine. So any generation that you didn't contribute below zero is not billed against you.

Obviously I know nothing about this market, but it seems like there's got to be a way to incentivize producers to weatherize and be prepared for this kind of weather...even if it only happens once every 10 years.

gonemaroon said:

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Load was 75,000 forecasted and they only had say 65,000MW of generation so they knew for damn near a week that they would have to do rotational outages. Rotational outages are a big deal, but it's orderly and not a black out. They knew this and were prepared for it, the odd thing is they never alerted the public to the extent of having to curtail and rotate that many people on and off. But that is what it is. In that case since it's basically never been done you know damn effing well the CEO of ERCOT and every brain trust in the entire organization should have been in that room. This is a HUGE HUGE HUGE deal in itself.

From that point / what I am saying is they knew they had to cut load they knew they were going to do it and then they didn't do it on time and when they needed to. Instead they sat there and watched the **** hit the fan beyond a point of repair. This is what happened / they are going to try to blow smoke up everyone's ass.

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If this wasn't treated as a war room situation then they should all be definitely fired. They knew this was a potential 100 yr event coming so if the CEO and other execs are getting calls after it hits the fan that we have a problem then they need to be ousted.

YouBet said:

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Shanked Punt said:

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Zobel said:

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Plants aren't normally down for maintenance in winter. Outages are in spring and fall.

The market is doing want people want / demand - cheap power, as cheap as possible on average. Side effect is infrequent events like this.

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And this is very much a failure of the free market.

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A quarter of our power is wind which is fed subsidized so it can exist.

There are obviously many issues at play here but your blanket free market comment is dumb. As usual.

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The free market now will likely have caused deaths and hundreds of billions of dollars worth of property damage, all because of the decisions made by the plant owners. Those costs were never accounted for.

Sorry if I missed it but does anyone know why STP shut down one of their units?

Anyone know the status of Comanche Peak as well?