Texas is represented by some loathsome public officials (looking at you, Governor Abbott, Lt. Gov. Patrick, and Senator Ted Cruz). They have denounced President Biden in every imaginable way. Yet the Biden administration is sending $16 billion to Texas for clean energy and infrastructure. Texas Republicans voted against the legislation but they will gladly take the dollars and the new jobs. (All the red states are getting funds from Biden’s bills that they opposed, while taking credit for them.) And they will continue to insist that climate change is a hoax.
Chris Tomlinson writes in The Houston Chronicle:
Delivering reliable, affordable and sustainable electricity wouldn’t be difficult if officials in Austin and Washington worked together. The challenges are not technological or economic; they are about setting priorities.
Pablo Vegas, chief executive of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, promised a new approach to grid planning on Tuesday, promising to better track the growing demand for power from industry.
“We need to accelerate aspects of our planning processes and be able to look further into the future, anticipate what’s coming, because it still takes three to six years to build transmission,” Vegas said.
The Legislature ordered ERCOT to start considering long-term proposals to add load to the grid rather than relying only on finalized plans. The new approach makes demand forecasts look much, much larger but also less reliable because not all proposed projects come to fruition.
President Joe Biden, meanwhile, is offering Texans billions of dollars to fortify the electric grid, reduce electricity bills and cut greenhouse gas emissions. On Thursday, the administration promised to upgrade 100,000 miles of transmission lines.
The Environmental Protection Agency also gave $249.7 million to the Texas Solar For All Coalition and $156.1 million to the Clean Energy Fund of Texas this week to provide solar energy equipment to low-income communities.
The EPA has also granted $104 million in federal funds to 19 Texas school districts to purchase 288 electric school buses. The EPA grants are part of the $16 billion the federal government has committed to clean energy projects in Texas that have created 23,000 jobs.
The money comes from the Inflation Reduction Act, which Texas Republicans vehemently opposed. The massive investment in energy and manufacturing is intended to grow the economy while fighting climate change.
Past investments led Waaree Energies to invest $1 billion in a solar panel manufacturing facility near Houston, creating 1,500 jobs. San Antonio has committed $30 million to build, with federal help, the largest municipal onsite solar project in Texas. Diligence Offshore Services announced in August it would invest $1.23 billion to open an offshore wind support and manufacturing facility off the coast of Port Arthur.
Climate change, though, is still missing from Vegas’ and ERCOT’s lexicon. He’s happy to talk about the growing electricity demand from artificial intelligence and fossil fuel facilities but never mentions the residential demand during climate change-driven extreme weather. That’s what causes record-setting peaks that can trigger outages.
Nationwide, weather caused 80% of the power outages since 2000, and the frequency of blackouts has doubled in the past decade, according to data collated by research nonprofit Climate Central. Texas experienced the most weather-related outages, and the pace is accelerating.
Improving the grid to meet growing industrial electricity demand is quite different from building a system that can withstand a changing climate. Adding more power generation and transmission lines is not enough when facing stronger hurricanes, larger wildfires, colder winter storms and hotter summers.
ERCOT’s planning will remain flawed until officials start preparing for more polar vortexes like 2021’s Winter Storm Uri, rain events like Hurricane Harvey and heat waves like last summer’s.
Transitioning to clean energy and building resilient generation plants and transmission lines offer huge economic opportunities. BlackRock, the world’s largest financial manager, says the world spent $1.8 trillion on the energy transition in 2023 but will need to spend $4 trillion annually by the mid-2030s.
Vegas never mentions climate change because the Republican elected officials who oversee him call it a hoax. Texas will never chart a strong economic course until we have a governor, lieutenant governor and speaker who recognize the greatest threat yet to human prosperity….
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Joe Biden is a president for all America. He is above the petty partisan games that right wing politicians play. He does not get enough credit for his visionary policies that will take time and money to bring to fruition. If Trump should prevail, make no mistake, California and New York will be on his vindictive hit list. He will cut aid blue led states. When Superstorm Sandy hit New York, many in the GOP including Ted Cruz voted against helping the people of New York. Democrats have generally provided aid to Florida and other states that have faced natural disasters regardless of the state’s political leadership. https://whyy.org/articles/are-texas-senators-who-opposed-njsandy-aid-hypocrites/
“He is above the petty partisan games that right wing politicians play.”
Umm. . . No! He is just well skilled, better than most, in playing those games.
All politicians play games. It is the nature of politics, but some games cost lives like refusing to expand Medicaid or denying medical services to women.
I agree that Joe Biden is not above taking politics into consideration in policy decisions. However, when it comes to infrastructure and emergency relief, there’s no evidence that political ramifications influence his actions. It’s more than skill—it’s a right-minded disposition toward the role of a president. I think that retired teacher’s assertion is essentially accurate.
Of course Texas joined 9 other states, one of which is my own, in refusing medicaid funds. Seems it is OK to get money for some things but not for others.
If the money is going to poor people, forget it.
YES … AGREE, retired teacher.
Biden’s “Build, Back, Better,” which has been either ignored or ridiculed by many in the media, is a plan to provide a more secure country for future generations. He may be an “OG,” but he has a plan for the future. The autocratic GOP has no plan other than more tax cuts for billionaire, kissing Putin’s ring and subjugating women and dissenters. We as a nation would lose credibility around the world under their regressive regime.
Infrastructure dollars are rebuilding roads, bridges, tunnels, and other essential facilities in blue and red states alike. The red state politicians vote against it, then take credit for it.
“Texas is represented by some loathsome public officials (looking at you, Governor Abbott, Lt. Gov. Patrick, and Senator Ted Cruz).”
Let’s not neglect giving Attorney General Ken Paxton his due, please. As for climate change….The (fake news) Washington Post recently ran a story about precipitous sea-level rise in the southern U.S. A map at the article’s beginning displays the rise since 2010 at certain locations along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts. The largest rise shown is at Galveston, just down the road from Houston. Now, I hear tell that Houston currently has a problem with a li’l rain pouring down from a warmed atmosphere that holds more water that eventually has to go somewhere. Gravitational theory dictates that the somewhere is the Earth’s surface. But one shouldn’t assume that Texas’s loathsome leaders and Republican state legislators accept Newton’s explanation for his getting beaned by that apple, either.
So true. The loathsome elected leaders of Texas deny climate change while their constituents suffer from its consequences.
I don’t know how I omitted State Attorney General Ken Paxton from the short list of deplorable state officials. He’s been under indictment for years. He dances to the tune of his donors.
Aside from being the proper thing to do, giving red states what they need from the federal government is wise.
Those who bruit about, insisting people just leave places like Texas or Florida, or Idaho are playing right into the hands of those who seek to divide the country. (Remember Lincoln’s words.)
Imagine blue states surrounded by red ones, lacking money, public education for children, reproductive rights, affordable health care, ruled, not governed, by a handful of autocrats who refuse to relinquish power. Do you think the blue states would rest easy?
We’re in a bad place, but simply turning away from people in states with corrupt officials won’t fix it.