2021 Statewide Power Crisis

Texas has now endured the largest power failure in state history. The human and economic toll is staggering. The likes of which have never been seen in the history of our state. As Texas begins recovery efforts, the 87th Legislature must also account for the decades of lapsed oversight that precipitated this disaster. As early as 1989, Texas experienced outages because the state lacked mandatory regulations. Recommendations by the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUC) to equip for cold weather events were continually ignored by private companies, which forced the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) to resort to rolling blackouts during the 2011 winter storm. This white paper tracks the persistent failure of the Texas government to compel private systems to prepare for extreme winter weather, highlighting recommendations by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) that were disregarded in the wake of the 2011 outages. This white paper concludes with practical steps to hold Texas power systems accountable.