Texas weather: Are frozen wind turbines to blame for power cuts?

- BBC News 2021-02-17, 10(49 PM

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Texas weather: Are frozen Top Stories

wind turbines to blame for Deaths mount as US storm causes

major power cuts
power cuts? At least 21 people have died while many more
are struggling with power cuts and frigid
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Texas weather: Are frozen wind turbines to blame for power cuts? - BBC News 2021-02-17, 10(49 PM

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Texas capital, Austin, has seen traffic delays and power cuts due to the storm

As freezing temperatures grip the southern United States, there have been
major power failures across Texas as increased demand for heating has
overwhelmed the energy grid.

Supplies of both electricity and gas have been intermittent, with the Luxury Sleeper Vans on Sale
authorities saying they need to "safely manage the balance of supply and
demand on the grid" to avoid another major power cut.
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Republican representatives and media commentators have blamed green
energy policies, in particular the increased use of wind turbines.
Features
"So it was all working great until the day it got cold outside," Fox News's
Tucker Carlson said.

"The windmills failed like the silly fashion accessories they are, and people in
Texas died."

What went wrong?

The bitingly cold temperatures have caused major problems across the energy
sector in Texas. In freezing US, Biden seeks to cool
down politics
Wind turbines froze, as well as vital equipment at gas wells and in the nuclear
industry.

But because gas and other non-renewable energies contribute far more to the
grid than wind power, particularly in winter, these shortages had a far greater
impact on the system.

So when critics pointed to a loss of nearly half of Texas's wind-energy capacity

as a result of frozen turbines, they failed to point out double that amount was
being lost from gas and other non-renewable supplies such as coal and
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Texas weather: Are frozen wind turbines to blame for power cuts? - BBC News 2021-02-17, 10(49 PM

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A winter storm has brought historic cold weather and power cuts to Texas

Texas has promoted the development of wind energy over the past 15 years.

And on average, renewable energy sources - mostly wind - account for about How this Mars landing will be
20% of its energy supply. different to before
But the largest proportion comes from fossil fuels, as well as 10% from
nuclear.

On Tuesday, the state's principal energy supplier, the Electricity Reliability

Council of Texas (Ercot), said the freezing conditions had led to:

30GW being taken offline from gas, coal and nuclear sources

a 16GW loss in capacity in wind and other renewable energy supplies

And this, it said, had severely curtailed its ability to satisfy a peak demand of 'Clothes should float in and out of
69GW over the past few days - a surge even greater than anticipated. our lives'
In its plan for an extreme winter weather event, Ercot says it expects only 7%
to be provided by wind energy.

The company's Dan Woodfin said: "It appears that a lot of the generation that
has gone offline today has been primarily due to issues on the natural gas
system."

The cold weather also affected a water system needed to run the South Texas
Nuclear Power Station, causing one reactor to shut down.

Dr Joshua Rhodes, at the University of Texas at Austin, tweeted: "There is no Are frozen wind turbines to blame
single resource to blame for this. for Texas power cuts?

"We usually think of peak events happening over a couple of hours. This one is
lasting days.

"Wind has been below expected output. But so have other sources."

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Texas weather: Are frozen wind turbines to blame for power cuts? - BBC News 2021-02-17, 10(49 PM

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The cold weather is set to continue prepares for jail

Could Texas source energy from

elsewhere?
Texas is the only state in the US with an independent power grid, meaning it is
largely dependent on its own resources.

In normal times, this works fine because Texas is a large producer of energy, BBC Culture: The revolutionary
both fossil and renewable, and can provide enough for its population and singers erased from history
export to other states.

But when its infrastructure is under strain, for example during a cold-weather
event, most of the state cannot link up with other grids around the US to make
Elsewhere on the BBC
up the shortfall.

Texas officials have now called for a hearing into the state's grid's ability to
cope with extreme weather events.

Misleading claims on social media

The debate about renewable energy and the blackouts in Texas has also
prompted the sharing of misleading claims online.
Football phrases
One image widely circulating on Twitter and Facebook shows a helicopter de- 15 sayings from around the world
icing a wind turbine, with some comments suggesting it is in Texas.

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Texas weather: Are frozen wind turbines to blame for power cuts? - BBC News 2021-02-17, 10(49 PM

But the picture actually shows ice being removed from a wind turbine in video chat site 6
Sweden, using hot water.

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BBC News traced the image back to a 2016 report published by Swedish
company Alpine Helicopter, demonstrating "airborne de-icing solutions" for hospital 7
wind turbines.
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