Last Winter many Texans were affected by the North American Winter Storm, which lasted for only 44 hours, but costed over 18 billion in damages and took the lives of 69 individuals.

The recurring memories of this traumatic experience has people asking if they should be concerned about the power grids for this winter.

The answer however is not a simple one, as experts and Texas officials are clashing over whether our grids have been improved enough to survive a repeat of Februarys storms, especially with winter coming up.

“Everything that needed to be done was done to fix the power grid,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said. Abbott believes that we shouldn’t be concerned about another outage, and it’s no cause for concern.

Texas was unprepared for the storm last February because the Texas power grid is isolated from the national power supply and the Texas government decided against updating the system before winter.

Texas is the Nation’s top energy producer, which has many Americans concerned after seeing what happened last February.

The weatherization requirements passed requirements to help prepare us for another disaster but allowed power plants to request exceptions if they record their attempt to trying them.

Curt Morgan, The CEO of Texas Utility, has spent over 50 million dollars to try and help weatherize 12 of his power plants across Texas by putting in shield valves, pumps, and metal pipes. Morgan Still fears that no matter what he does, it won’t be enough as he fears the worst.

Experts say that Texas grids are still vulnerable, in part because of the loose restrictions for the power companies that allow them to get out of numerous weatherization requirements.

Though there may not be a problem right away with weather being as unpredictable as it is, it’s probably wise to prepare so this won’t affect you as much as it affected many Texans in the past.

Source:

KVUE