Government policies - they're that stupid

Do the environmentalists ever stop to think about how electricity is made? Like, from burning coal and oil and splitting atoms...

When Liberal policies come to fruition . . .

You know in Texas, they issued an alert that their power grid can't handle them washing their clothes, right? Or cooking their food in the oven.

Compare that and contrast, if you will.

Nope. That's the solar grid and the wind grid. The coal and oil grid can handle just about anything.

As well as I understand it, that alert only applies to their renewable sector.

Correct me if I'm wrong though.

No. Once you're on the grid, you're on the grid. Energy customers have no idea how much of their power comes from renewables and how much doesn't.

The customers may not, but the energy utilities themselves should be able to do so because they have to have enough constant baseload power to always power the grid no matter the circumstances. Renewables by their nature usually aren't factored into those baseload calculations because they can be fickle.

I've not seen the actual update though. Was it just a, "Hey, we don't have the ability to solely power the state with renewables." announcement or a legitimate, "Hey, we don't have enough baseload power to keep the state running at all."?

You're on the internet right now. How is it so hard to look up what I'm talking about? The energy companies aren't being told to cut down on their washing and cooking to keep demand down, THE CITIZENRY ARE!

I'm lazy and you keep responding. ;)

But I went to the source and looked at ercot's announcement on the matter. Seems to be latent issues with their grid due to repairs.

http://www.ercot.com/news/releases/show/233037

IMO, sounds like they put off general maintenance and winterization for far too long and it's still biting them in the butt.

Yeah, it's almost like Texas' infrastructure badly suffers due to its stubborn refusal to levy state taxes like everybody else does or something!

Texas has plenty of state taxes. As I recall, they're one of five or six states that simply don't levy an income tax. A lot of states cut one or more tax forms. Washington doesn't have property, here in MT we don't pay sales tax (though I wish we'd impose one and get rid of the property tax).

How a state manages its revenue is entirely another matter and I don't know enough about Texas to feel qualified to speak on it.

Well, for your consideration, compare and contrast the OP's complaint about California's energy grid with my point about Texas' energy grid and ask yourself if maybe that revenue management might play a more important role than you're giving it credit for.

Whose credit am I denying? I outright said that management of its actual funds is more important anyhow. Both California and Texas are economic titans that, at current levels, more than have the capability to completely insulate their grids from harm and likely invest a lot into renewables as well.

Oh my God, I can't phrase it much simpler than that. I really can't.

You phrased nothing but a request that I think about...what I already said. I know for a fact that Texas' state revenue as of right now is about $250,000,000,000. They've got plenty of money. The question is what do they do with it. The solution isn't more money, it's smarter monetary policy. The gulf between the two is vast.

Compare and contrast what? Texas power shortages to California power shortages?

Yeah, basically. California is asking people to charge their cars less, Texas is asking people to stop cooking food. Does that not convey a somewhat obvious sense of which state is more strained?

BAHAHAHAHA - that's not what they're telling us in Texas. They're asking us to turn our thermostats up a few degrees and to consider cooking outside (which is what we do pretty often anyway)

Uh huh. And if you don't, the energy company will do it for you remotely.

Or are you going to pretend that THAT wee little piece of dystopia isn't happening right now either?

California is asking people to reduce all their energy usage also. FLEX Alert includes using electricity for everything. They explicitly said charging electric cars, just like they explicitly said using washers and dryers, air conditioners, etc.

The only reason I mentioned just the electric cars is because CA is trying to make it a mandate that only electric vehicles are sold and driven in the state. People who are against that mandate point out that our electrical grid can't handle adding to that much electricity consumption. And people who support that mandate need to be reminded as often as possible the outcomes of their idiotic policies.