Nearly Half Of Texas’ Wind Turbines Frozen In Winter Storm, Limiting State’s Power Output

The overall power output of Texas has declined after nearly half of the state’s wind turbines, which produce around 20% of the state’s power, were frozen in a winter storm over the weekend while the state’s natural gas system, which the state relies on for about 50% of its energy, simultaneously experienced “issues.”

“The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) entered emergency conditions and initiated rotating outages at 1:25 a.m. today,” ERCOT announced in a press release Monday. “About 10,500 MW of customer load was shed at the highest point. This is enough power to serve approximately two million homes. Extreme weather conditions caused many generating units – across fuel types – to trip offline and become unavailable. There is now over 30,000 MW of generation forced off the system.”