Texas’ electric grid manager took a step back Friday on its emergency alerts, moving from an “energy emergency alert 3” (EEA3) to a level 2 around 9 a.m., then again to a level 1 at 10 a.m., a move that signals an improvement in the health of the state’s power infrastructure.

Level 3 alerts, the highest on the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) scale, are when rolling outages are triggered. A level 2 keeps large industrial users offline. Level 1, the lowest level, triggers conservation efforts. The EEA3 was triggered early Sunday morning due to a surge in demand during historic winter weather conditions. It’s the longest period of time the state’s grid operator has been in a critical state.

The last time was 2011 when the EEA3 lasted for just a day.

ERCOT reported a system capacity Friday of more than 64,000 megawatts, a little more than 10,000 megawatts more than the current demand. One megawatt of electricity can power around 200 homes during periods of peak demand.

ERCOT CEO and President Bill Magness and Senior Director of System Operations Dan Woodfin said operations have returned to normal, though conservation is still encouraged.

According to poweroutage.us, more than 190,000 customers were still without electricity Friday morning in the state. The largest impacts were along a line from Temple, in central Texas, eastward to the Louisiana border, including the Lufkin and Nacogdoches area. In west-central Texas, the Fredericksburg area reported just under half of Gillespie County’s 15,400 customers were still in the dark. In Edwards County, northwest of San Antonio, 53% of the service area was still without power.

The outlook was more promising in the Houston area. CenterPoint Energy reported just under 6,500 customers had no power Friday morning, representing .25% of the total served. Entergy reported just under more than 3,800 customers were without power.

Gov. Greg Abbott said Thursday that the remaining power outages were not due to a lack of generation like earlier in the week. Instead, the outages were because of other issues like downed lines.

“Every available repair truck has been dispatched to repair those downed power lines,” said Abbott.

CenterPoint Energy officials said Thursday crews restored approximately 1.3 million customers in a 24-hour period.

Magness and Woodfin faced another day of questioning after the ongoing power outage debacle left thousands in desperate situations.

ERCOT’s leaders were asked about whether they would be winterizing the power grid, but according to them, that’s not their responsibility.

“We don’t own the generation units,” Magness said. “We don’t own the transmission. We’re really just managing the overall transmission system and dispatching, putting generators on and off the grid.”

He added that winterization will need to be undertaken by the entities who own the physical assets out in the field.

“We’re willing to work and help and make sure those are effective and happy to help with any of the industry on that,” Magness continued. “But it’s not really our role to do winterization.”

The Texas Public Utility Commission issued an order Wednesday mandating that all-electric transmission and distribution utilities perform rolling blackouts in a manner that no customer is without power for more than 12 hours. It’s unclear if the order would be effective though, as utility providers were not able to keep up with the demand for electricity this week.

Source: abc13.com

HOUSTON – President Joe Biden spoke with Gov. Greg Abbott Thursday evening regarding the severe weather storms impacting Texas, according to a press release from the White House.

Biden said the federal government will continue to work with state and local authorities to provide relief and address the critical needs of residents. Earlier this week, the government sent generators, bottled water, and other resources to Texas.

He also shared his plans to instruct federal agencies to look into any immediate steps that could be taken to support Texans at this time, per the release.

Source: www.click2houston.com

A boil water notice in Houston will likely be lifted Monday, Mayor Sylvester Turner announced during a briefing Thursday.

“We’re still looking at some times, probably at the best I would say Sunday, but I’m just going to say Monday,” Turner said. “So we will still be in this boil water status probably until about Sunday or Monday.”

Houston residents Wednesday were warned to boil their water — if they had the power to do so– after water pressure plummeted throughout the Houston-area. Residents are advised to use bottled or boiled water for drinking, cooking and hygiene purposes like brushing your teeth or washing your face until the notice is lifted.

Since Wednesday, water pressure has improved across Houston, said Mayor Sylvester Turner, though the city’s public works department is still working to build up and stabilize it.

“It takes some time to really stabilize it and then once it has stabilized and it’s above 20 in terms of the pressure — it needs to be right around 35, really — and we don’t anticipate that taking place until tomorrow,” said Turner.

City officials urged residents to continue conserving water.

“If the water pressure is up in your home, for example, don’t just go out and start washing a lot of clothes and all of that because we still need to enhance water pressure and to build it up and then to stabilize it,” said Turner.

During the briefing, Turner also announced that water distribution sites will open in each of the city council’s districts around 2 p.m. today. He tasked each council member with designating those sites. Not sure which district you live in? View a map of the city’s council districts here.

“We want to do it this way because we don’t want people to be converging on just one or two sites,” said Mayor Turner. “We want to establish sites throughout the City that will be accessible through a lot of individuals.”

One of the designated sites was the Jewish Community Center in southwest Houston. The JCC was given 84 cases of water and ran out in about 30 minutes.

According to the public works department, the city’s water pressure dropped below the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality’s (TCEQ) required minimum of 20 PSI on Tuesday afternoon, prompting the water boil notice.

A combination of bursting pipes and equipment failures at water distribution facilities amid the freezing weather caused the plummeting water pressure, said Carol Haddock, director of public works.

Turner announced a fund will be created to assist those recovering from infrastructure damage related to the freeze. Turner also said CenterPoint Energy’s Chief Executive Officer David J. Lesar had agreed to serve as the fund’s chair.

After water pressure returns to normal levels, a 24-hour observation period on water samples must occur before the boil water notice can be lifted.

Dozens of nearby municipalities, including the Pearland, Katy, and Sugarland areas have also issued boil water notices.

Source: www.click2houston.com