Congressman Gonzalez Joins Texas Democratic Delegation Demanding Answers on Power Outages

Press Release

Today, Congressman Vicente Gonzalez (TX-15) joined nine members of Texas' Democratic Congressional Delegation in demanding immediate answers from leadership of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) and Public Utility Commission of Texas as to the cause, duration, and equitable distribution of power outages across the state of Texas.

"We need an explanation for the catastrophic power outages," said Congressman Gonzalez. "Vulnerable populations -- the sick, the elderly, and disabled, - and millions more Texans are freezing because of the state's failure to plan and invest in infrastructure. No Texan should have outages for over 24 hours, especially in such extreme temperatures. We need to get to the bottom of this. These questions must be answered immediately."

Additional letter signatories include: Reps. Joaquin Castro, Lloyd Doggett, Henry Cuellar, Filemon Vela, Lizzie Fletcher, Marc Veasey, Veronica Escobar, Sylvia Garcia, and Al Green.

The full letter text can be found here and below:

Dear Mr. Magness and Ms. Walker,

We write to express grave concern over the lack of power and heat for millions of Texas families in the middle of dangerous winter storm with record low temperatures.

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) is responsible for scheduling power and ensuring a reliable source of energy through the Texas electrical network. ERCOT has declared a statewide power generation shortfall emergency and directed energy providers to reduce the burden on the Texas Power Grid though controlled outages.

We understand that the demand for power continues to exceed supply and the importance of stabilizing the statewide grid, but controlled outages are supposed to be limited to 10 to 15 minutes before being rotated to a different neighborhood. More than 4 million Texas families are without power, many for over 24 hours and counting. As while Texans were freezing in the dark last night, many downtown skylines continued to shine bright. To better understand these issues, we request prompt answers to the following questions:

How are you enforcing the equitable distribution of "controlled" power outages?
How are energy providers in your network managing these outages?
Why did ERCOT wait until midnight on Sunday (2/14) to announce power outages?
What are you doing to decrease the duration and frequency of outages across Texas?
What is your plan if the statewide grid does not stabilize in the next 24 hours?

Texans deserve immediate answers, accountability, and their power restored as soon as possible. Thank you for your urgent concern and immediate attention to this matter. I expect your response no later than tomorrow, February 17th, 2021.

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