US grid watchdog urges cold weather protections

The entity that oversees grid reliability across the US is working to require power plant owners to protect equipment against extreme cold and ice, in response to severe electric outages in Texas during a cold snap in February.

The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) today issued initial recommendations and findings on the cold snap, which left millions across the US midcontinent without electricity and the ability to heat their homes, sometimes for days. That report marks a first step to adopting binding standards that would require power plants to make cold weather upgrades, possibly before the onset of the 2023-24 winter.

Texas health officials say more than 200 people in the state died from the winter storm, primarily from hypothermia but also from carbon monoxide poisoning and fires.

US grid operators during the cold weather started rotating outages on 15 February when nearly 62GW of electrical generation went off line. Plant outages were the worst in the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), where an average of 34GW of generation was unavailable for 15-17 February, nearly half of the grid's all-time peak winter load.

Frozen equipment was responsible for 44pc of the unplanned power generation outages during the storm because of a failure to winterize equipment, the report said, with some outages coming from ice on wind turbines. Fuel issues were the second largest cause of outages, representing 33pc of lost generation, driven by a loss of natural gas from frozen wellhead equipment and outages at gas processing plants.

The NERC report, issued jointly with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), recommends that power plants protect cold-sensitive equipment before the 2023-24 winter and be eligible for compensation for those upgrades. Plants that already tripped off line from cold weather should develop corrective action plans before the 2022-23 winter, it finds. The report says the US Congress, states and regulators should also require the natural gas sector to better prepare for cold weather.

NERC is working to finalize its recommendations by November, after which it could draft mandatory reliability standards that would go to FERC for approval. The standards would be more robust than reforms Texas enacted after the storm, by setting binding requirements that could lead to FERC enforcement action if they are ignored.

Texas lawmakers have kept most of the state cut off from other electric grids to avoid being subject to federal oversight, with maximum power imports of 1.2GW. But FERC chairman Richard Glick said the state's lack of interconnections likely exacerbated the severity of power outages, which were less severe in regions that could draw power from unaffected states.

"This is not about jurisdiction, it is about saving lives," Glick said. "There are always ways we can work together to ensure Texas retains a strong voice."

By Chris Knight