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Power Outages: Failure of Wind Turbines has been a Major Part of the Problem
The screen capture above was posted at rumble.com.
Following are three quotes from an op-ed that appeared in the Wall Street Journal of February 16, 2021, and the op-ed is entitled "The Political Making of a Texas Power Outage". The quotes were reproduced in the video that is linked to below, and they extend from 14:11 - 16:56.
(Texas Governor Greg) Abbott blamed his state's extensive power outages on generators freezing early Monday morning, noting 'this includes the natural gas & coal generators.' But frigid temperatures and icy conditions have descended on most of the country. Why couldn't Texas handle them while other states did?The problem is (Texas') (over-reliance) on wind power that has left the grid more vulnerable to bad weather. Half of wind turbines froze last week, causing wind's share of electricity to plunge to 8% from 42%. Power prices in the wholesale market spiked, and grid regulators on Friday warned of rolling blackouts. Natural gas and coal generators ramped up to cover the supply gap but couldn't meet the surging demand for electricity -- which half of households rely on for heating -- even as many families powered up their gas furnaces. Then some gas wells and pipelines froze.What I didn't know is that fully 42% of Texas' power output has come from wind power. That's not far from literally half of Texas' electrical production.In short, there wasn't enough baseload power from coal and nuclear to support the grid. Baseload power is needed to stabilize grid frequency amid changes in demand and supply. When there's not enough baseload power, the grid gets unbalanced and power sources can fail. The more the grid relies on intermittent renewables like wind and solar, the more baseload power is needed to back them up.
Video | The first 25 minutes of the video deal with the reasons why a lot of the Texas electrical grid went down.
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