Photo via @MiiSS_JAZZY_B/Twitter, @LS2longhorn/Twitter
June 17, 2021, 1:52 pm*
Just three months after suffering an unprecedented snow and ice storm followed by a deep freeze that left millions without power and with frozen toilets, killing over 100 people, the U.S. South is now dealing with a severe heatwave as the effects of climate change kick into gear. All of this has been worse for Texans, where the state created its own independent energy grid away from the rest of the nation and which has turned out to be a colossal failure that can’t withstand either the cold or the heat.
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In March, widespread power failures were attributed to the failure of the Texas government to weatherize their gas pipelines against freezing, massively overloading the system. Now, misnamed Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) is begging Texans to shut off the air conditioning and set thermostats into the 80s as well as avoid using basic appliances like ovens because the efforts of their residents to keep cool in the summer is again resulting in power outages because the grid can’t handle it.
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Naturally, Texans are not happy about the requests to conserve power and the possibility of facing power outages just three months after the last disaster, while wondering what the state government was doing to address these continuous issues in the meantime. Even Austin’s mayor went after Governor Greg Abbott for this failure, calling him out for trying to fund the border wall that Trump never got close to finishing instead of fixing problems with basic services.
“Maybe when a corporation tells the governor that an unreliable power grid is bad for business, he’ll finally listen,” tweeted Mayor Steve Adler. “He doesn’t seem to care about whether it’s bad for people.”
Others with less power (both politically and literally) inside and outside of Texas have also taken to Twitter to express their feelings about ERCOT and their state government, and these are some of the best results, including plenty of dunks on Ted Cruz:
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Breaking News!
Ted Cruz seen flying to Alaska amid power outages in Texas due to heat. Blames his wife and kids wanting to see snow in June! pic.twitter.com/JmOZRZA22v
—
DeathMetalViking
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ERCOT sorry but my dad told me I can’t touch the thermostat
— AviCado
(@AviSanjel) June 15, 2021
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*First Published: June 17, 2021, 1:51 pm
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