@tedcruz Texas failed to winterize its generation sources the last time this happened in 2011.

Now ask yourself, why?

Simple. Texas's extended power outage is a result of negligent GOP infrastructure policy.

THREAD.

@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz The Texas GOP has continuously rebuffed plans to invest in better infrastructure to upgrade TX power grids.

Texas was warned to weatherize power plants.

Why didn’t they?
@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz TX power companies said electricity prices are too low to provide incentives (profit) to build new plants or improve older ones. (a result of privatization of basic services.)
@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz The electrical grid in Texas was deregulated, privatized, and removed from interconnected networks to avoid federal regulation and increase profits for a small number of wealthy individuals.

Go figure.
@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz If TX ERCOT grid was on the national grid, or simply reinvested in their privatized infrastructure, they'd be fine by now.

They did neither, b/c it wasn't profitable.

It's a failure of TX leadership –– total, inexcusable, and utterly catastrophic.

Not fucking windmills.
@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz https://t.co/IOLZPymRu1
@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz https://t.co/A0HOfw993I
@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz With millions of Texans still without power amid frigid temperatures, false claims that wind and solar energy were primarily to blame spread across social media.

But gas, coal and nuclear plants caused nearly twice as many outages as wind and solar.

https://t.co/TRWr9x5N3q
@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz No. Frozen wind turbines aren’t the main culprit for Texas’ power outages. Wind power accounts for an est. 17.5% of the electricity generated in Texas.

Texas is a natural gas state.

https://t.co/kh38epoWZ0
@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz And @ERCOT_ISO has confirmed that most of the generating loss has come from (largely deregulated) gas and nuclear facilities.

Rather than taking ownership for *any* of this crisis,
@GregAbbott_TX is lying about its cause—to try to score cheap (and inaccurate) political points.
@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz @ERCOT_ISO @GregAbbott_TX Meanwhile, the parts of Texas not on its privatized ERCOT power grid (El Paso) appear to have weathered the freeze with few outages.

https://t.co/xBSqxI193K
@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz @ERCOT_ISO @GregAbbott_TX https://t.co/amMBDCM4XM
@ProjectLincoln @tedcruz @ERCOT_ISO @GregAbbott_TX https://t.co/K0DUHDYndU

More from Government

Which metric is a better predictor of the severity of the fall surge in US states?

1) Margin of Democrat victory in Nov 2020 election
or
2) % infected through Sep 1, 2020

Can you guess which plot is which?


The left plot is based on the % infected through Sep 1, 2020. You can see that there is very little correlation with the % infected since Sep 1.

However, there is a *strong* correlation when using the margin of Biden's victory (right).

Infections % from
https://t.co/WcXlfxv3Ah.


This is the strongest single variable I've seen in being able to explain the severity of this most recent wave in each state.

Not past infections / existing immunity, population density, racial makeup, latitude / weather / humidity, etc.

But political lean.

One can argue that states that lean Democrat are more likely to implement restrictions/mandates.

This is valid, so we test this by using the Government Stringency Index made by @UniofOxford.

We also see a correlation, but it's weaker (R^2=0.36 vs 0.50).

https://t.co/BxBBKwW6ta


To avoid look-ahead bias/confounding variables, here is the same analysis but using 2016 margin of victory as the predictor. Similar results.

This basically says that 2016 election results is a better predictor of the severity of the fall wave than intervention levels in 2020!

You May Also Like