WASHINGTON - Former Texas governor Rick Perry suggests that going days without power is a sacrifice Texans should be willing to make if it means keeping federal regulators out of the states power grid. In a blog posted on House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy's website, Perry is quoted responding to the claim that those watching on the left may see the situation in Texas as an opportunity to expand their top-down, radical proposals.
Texans would be without electricity for longer than three days to keep the federal government out of their business, Perry is quoted as saying. Try not to let whatever the crisis of the day is take your eye off of having a resilient grid that keeps America safe personally, economically, and strategically. Texass power grid, run by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT, occupies a unique distinction in the United States in that it does not cross state lines and thus is not under the oversight of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. That has long been a point of pride with Texas politicians who in the 2000s chose to deregulate the state's power market and allow power companies, not state regulators, determine when and how to build and maintain power plants. That system has fallen under scrutiny in recent days as millions of Texans are left without power following an unusual cold snap. Following a near identical episode a decade ago, federal regulators warned Texas it needed to take steps to better insulate its power plants.
But there is little indication that happened, prompting criticism of ERCOT from Texas Republicans and Democrats alike. Perry, former president Donald trump's energy secretary, however, blamed the rolling blackouts on the rise of wind and solar energy in Texas.
If wind and solar is where were headed, the last 48 hours ought to give everybody a real pause and go wait a minute, Perry said. We need to have a baseload. And the only way you can get a baseload in this country is [with] natural gas, coal, and nuclear. That argument has been made by numerous conservatives in the midst of the blackouts. But it does not line up with early reports indicating the majority of the lost generation was natural gas plants not wind turbines, which actually performed better than grid regulators had anticipated, said Michael Webber an energy professor at the University of Texas.
I'll never forget Perry held a massive outdoor prayer session for rain