AUSTIN, Texas — ERCOT is sending inspectors across the state of Texas to make sure power plants are ready for the winter.
On Monday, the agency that manages the state's power grid announced a new group of weatherization inspectors. ERCOT said they will immediately be deployed into the field to begin inspections of electrical generation units and transmission facilities.
“There are unique challenges that each weather season in Texas presents for the grid. The winter preparedness efforts made by market participants, reinforced by ERCOT weatherization inspections, continue to strengthen the reliability and resiliency of the ERCOT grid,” ERCOT President and CEO Pablo Vegas said in a release on Monday.
ERCOT is working to shore up grid reliability and resiliency during the winter months, with additional ancillary services, an expanded fuel supply service and the deployment of additional weatherization inspectors.
“The Certified Weather Inspector program is an in-depth training course that requires participants to have a deep understanding of weatherization principles, techniques and standards,” said Kristi Hobbs, ERCOT's vice president of System Planning and Weatherization. “Their expertise in the field will continue to support our advanced winter preparedness inspections.”
ERCOT said its Weatherization and Inspection program is on track to complete 450 generation resource and transmission facility inspections this winter.
According to a new ERCOT simulation, the Texas electric grid is at risk of outages every three years.
Even though Texas power regulators say they’ve made a lot of progress on enhancing our electric grid, the power grid manager’s latest simulations show we could have blackouts every few years if there is a major winter storm similar to December 2022 or February 2021.
In September, the KVUE Defenders reported how power can become constrained on the grid. Power being produced in one area of the state cannot get to the demand in another part. Over the summer, ERCOT told wind farm companies to stop or reduce their production even though demand was high.
“The primary reason that ERCOT would ever curtail flow across the transmission line is if there's a concern of overloading it,” Vegas told KVUE at the time.