The Texas Grid Failure

Even for energy veterans, the depth of failures in Texas last week were breathtaking.

As arctic air froze power plants, gas lines, and mechanical instruments, the grid was shut down -- leaving 4 million people without electricity, unknown millions without heat, and three times that many without water.

Texas has been through freezes like this before in 2011, 2014 and 2018. Regulators were warned. So who is to blame for this historic catastrophe?

This week, we’ll talk about what happened in Texas -- reflecting on the responses and projecting the consequences for how we engineer the grid.

Then: did the shale boom fail to create all those promised jobs?

New research shows that the natural gas boom did not bring a massive employment wave to counties in the Marcellus and Utica shales. Wealth yes, but not so many jobs.

Wall Street Journal: In Frigid Texas, Desperate Families Take Risks to Stay WarmAssociated Press: Texas governor’s biggest donors: Energy industry that failedNBC: The GOP is rapidly becoming the blue-collar party. Here's what that means.Inside Climate News: A Decade Into the Fracking Boom, Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia Haven’t Gained Much, a Study Says

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The Energy Gang is brought to you by Wärtsilä Energy. Wärtsilä is leading the energy transition with the Atlas of 100% Renewable Energy. Stick with us at the end of the show to hear how this tool is helping us understand how to best spend stimulus dollars on the clean-energy transition.

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This podcast is also brought to you by CPower. CPower’s latest book, Demand-Side Energy Management in the Time of COVID, takes a peek into eight of the biggest commercial industries in North America and reveals key energy management strategies that successful organizations executed during the wildest year of the young century. Download it here.

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