Manager Hoyden posted:

If anyone is curious what Abbott said, these are the major points:
3. ERCOT lied to the state (this is surprising) about winterization of generators,

theCalamity posted:

Texas governors can’t be recalled. Right?

LLSix posted:

What are the odds Abbott is lying about this? I wouldn't be at all surprised if ERCOT honestly informed state gov that they had not winterized generators.

gently caress, it's not like this wasn't predicted a week in advance. People on facebook were panicking about the cold long enough in advance to order extra insulation and stuff for pipes. It's unconscionable the power plant owners who had their plants go offline didn't take any preventative steps. Especially the ones who went offline only because of fuel shortages or the "sudden" spike in the cost of same.

adoration for none posted:

Is there any campaign underway to recall Abbott as governor? It looks like some Democrats are calling for him to resign but obviously he won't.

Shifty Pony posted:

As the generation equipment gets loaded it tends to slow down and the frequency of the power generated starts to drop as well since the equipment doesn't have enough oomph to push the voltage positive and negative as fast as it normally could. Since there are tons of different types of generators on the system that happens unevenly across the grid.

That's real bad because if one generation plant is producing power at 60.000 cycles per second (Hz) and a second one is producing at 59.995Hz eventually the timing difference between the two units will grow large enough that one generator is trying to force the grid voltage positive and the other is trying to force it negative (a condition known as being "out of phase") which leads to essentially a short circuit hundreds of miles long.

There are protective elements in place to prevent that from happening and they would have been tripped. But when they trip they tend to cut off big sections of the grid from each other which causes the overload to spike causing more generators to lag causing more trips... eventually the grid just collapses into a few small islands that happen to have enough generation capacity for whatever is nearby.

Getting back from those islands to a fully functional grid is very very hard. Those islands are out of sync with each other, they have to be precisely and carefully brought to all be producing at exactly the same frequency and phase. Simultaneously you've got lots of plants that are entirely shut down and require power to start up (to pump coolant, power blowers that fan flames, etc), so you need to direct power to them and let them stabilize in a process called a "black start" AND get them synced up. Some plants will have damage since the protective equipment can only act so fast. It can take days to weeks to bring things back up.

Cutting loose all the load was the right call, they just never should have been in a position where they needed to do it.

Captain Monkey posted:

I brought along a rolling suitcase suitable for a 3-5 day trip to drop my daughters off in Cancun, I never intended to stay. - Ted Cruz

SlothfulCobra posted:

Although honestly, I think he'll get more poo poo for the mask ordinance than the horrible, horrible disaster that is his fault or the piss poor response to the pandemic.

JUST MAKING CHILI posted:

That’s just how much space a backup human suit takes. It’s not very heavy but for an entity of Ted’s mass it takes up a lot of space due to the non-Euclidean geometry of the interior required to support all of the gestational pods and acidic digestion hexagons.

adoration for none posted:

Is there any campaign underway to recall Abbott as governor? It looks like some Democrats are calling for him to resign but obviously he won't.

BoosterDuck posted:

sounds like a step up to me since qanoners get poo poo done

Friend posted:

What chaperone tries to ditch the kids in coach and get himself upgraded?

Captain Monkey posted:

has anyone said Fled Cruz yet?

Manager Hoyden posted:

If anyone is curious what Abbott said, these are the major points:
3. ERCOT lied to the state (this is surprising) about winterization of generators, and we are responding by giving them lots of money to pay for winterization in the future (this is not surprising).

LLSix posted:

What are the odds Abbott is lying about this? I wouldn't be at all surprised if ERCOT honestly informed state gov that they had not winterized generators.
gently caress, it's not like this wasn't predicted a week in advance. People on facebook were panicking about the cold long enough in advance to order extra insulation and stuff for pipes. It's unconscionable the power plant owners who had their plants go offline didn't take any preventative steps. Especially the ones who went offline only because of fuel shortages or the "sudden" spike in the cost of same.

Manager Hoyden posted:

I think it's entirely possible Abbott is lying but I doubt it. Then again, as they start pulling hundreds of dead bodies out of unheated apartments and nursing homes I'm sure Abbott will want the spotlight pointed at someone else.

Gromble posted:

ERCOT told power plants on February 8 to implement their winter weather operating plans starting on the 11th. The problem is that the power plants aren't required to have a winter plan or winterize their plants, because the legislature made it voluntary even after the February 2011 winter storm caused rolling outages. ERCOT just implements the policies decided by the legislature, PUC (whose commissioners are appointed by the governor), and their board (whose composition is set by the legislature and, surprise, is dominated by power companies).

adoration for none posted:

Is there any campaign underway to recall Abbott as governor? It looks like some Democrats are calling for him to resign but obviously he won't.

VitalSigns posted:

Does Texas even have recalls?

Also is getting Abbott to resign a good idea when the Lt Gov is worse? Like neither of them should be governor and it sucks to say Abbott is untouchable no matter what he does, but Dan Patrick should really definitely not be governor if we want people to not die from governmental spite/neglect

FBS posted:

https://twitter.com/corinne_perkins/status/1362472442678099974?s=20

zoux posted:

50 lbs of canned soup is a 2 day supply for Teddy

SlothfulCobra posted:

https://twitter.com/ashleyfeinberg/status/1362547805634625549

Sir Tonk posted:

guess we'll find out how much that "is a republican" category cruz enjoys will hold up another cycle.

Elephanthead posted:

BrutalistMcDonalds posted:

https://twitter.com/TexasTribune/status/1362483794339635206

D-Pad posted:

I can't even imagine how bad it would be if the whole state lost power for months. I'm using this to convince my wife to finally let me have some guns in the house "We have a generator. what do you think happens when the power has been out for weeks and we are one of the only people with one?"

Captain Monkey posted:

two people with guns won't change that lmao, life is not a movie.