30 Of The Best Reactions Texans Had To Being Told Not To Use ACs During A Heatwave
Living in Texas this year has been a true challenge—the power grid can’t handle the drastic weather changes and millions of people are suffering as a result. There’s a blistering heatwave ravaging Texas right now, reaching over 90 degrees F (32 degrees C). And Texans are urged to conserve power so as not to overload the independent power grid the state uses and to avoid an emergency like earlier this year.
Back in February, a massive and deadly winter storm hit the state and left millions without power because the infrastructure wasn’t upgraded to deal with such events and because Texas has its own electric power grid, managed by ERCOT, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas. More than 151 people died because of the cold and the power outages and several power companies went bankrupt.
Now, during the heatwave, Texans are asked to set their thermostats to 78 degrees F (25.6 degrees C) or higher during the day and 82 degrees F (27.8 degrees C) at night to save energy. Which means no relief from the heat. Bored Panda has collected some of the most spot-on reactions to ERCOT’s demands. Check them out below.
With temperatures soaring during the summer, we need to know how to remain healthy, hydrated, and cool. I reached out to Dr. Andrew Carroll, from Arizona, to hear how to survive in extreme heat, no matter where you live. "Living in Arizona, you learn how to live in the heat. We are currently in our own heatwave, with our temperatures hitting 117 degrees F in the afternoon (47 degrees C)," Dr. Carroll told Bored Panda.
"Dizziness, headache, abdominal pain, fatigue, body aches can be the first signs of heat exhaustion. If it’s a hot day and you start seeing these signs, get into air conditioning and start drinking fluids with electrolytes (PediaLyte, Gatorade, etc)," Dr. Carroll warned. "You should not return to outdoor activity anymore that day. Heatstroke is typically extreme fatigue, confusion, abdominal and body aches, and lack of sweating. Heatstroke should be evaluated at an Emergency Room, as it can be life-threatening."
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“California is now unable to perform even basic functions of civilization, like having reliable electricity,” he tweeted at the time. “Biden/Harris/AOC want to make CA’s failed energy policy the standard nationwide. Hope you don’t like air conditioning!” Mr Cruz added in the August 2020 tweet.
During heatwaves, how you structure your entire day can shift dramatically. Dr. Carroll explained how the people living in Arizona survive the heat and it's applicable to everyone.
"We survive it by:
-Going out to exercise as early as 4:30 am in order to get back by 5:30 am;
-Most people who work outside (construction, landscapers, roofers, farmers, etc.) start working around 5 am, and make sure to get back indoors by 2 pm at the latest;
-Get most errands done early in the morning (groceries, gas, etc.);
-Wait until the sun is no longer shining down before returning to outdoor activities;
-Park your vehicle under a tree when you can find one."
Dr. Carroll advised everyone to drink twice as much water or electrolyte fluid as they think they need during heatwaves. "Wear clothing which covers the skin completely and a wide-brimmed hat. Exposed skin will lead to dehydration more quickly, and increase your risk of skin cancer due to sun exposure. Do not wear confining or constricting clothing as it can impede your ability to sweat, which is crucial in keeping you cool," he said.
Nope, it also can't handle rain or storms. But what do you expect when you're given the choice between keeping pace with technological development and being able to buy another $1 million property this year.
Ted Cruz only cares for Ted Cruz like Donnie Trump only cares for Donnie Trump. They are both Republicans by the way....
ERCOT also asked Texans to unplug unused devices and avoid using large electric appliances (e.g. washing machines and pool pumps) until the demand for power drops down. This is the second energy conservation alert in Texas so far in 2021.
Texas’ independent power grid means that the state has far more independence, energy and decision-wise, it also means that when it gets overloaded or an emergency happens, there are fewer options to support your everyday Texans, who suffer as a result.
There’s less federal regulation but the cavalry won’t be rushing to the rescue every time that the state needs help, either, so it’s quite literally risking your people’s welfare for the sake of more freedom.
78 is my standard setting. I just need to not be hot, that's it. I don't need my home to be as cool as my refrigerator.
Back in May, ERCOT officials promised that the power grid would be able to provide enough electricity to meet the peak demand for energy in the summer. However, now there are fears that the demand is getting too big and that the power reserve margins are too narrow. Hence, the demand to conserve energy.
While in February, over 4 million people lost power as power generators iced over. And while some progress has occurred since then—lawmakers have made changes to ‘weatherize’ power plants to deal with extreme temperatures—experts believe that these reforms aren’t enough to prevent another similar disaster.
Wasn't he the jerk who fled to a warmer climate with jhs family when Texas was deep frozen and people were dying from hypothermia because the electrical infrastructure collapsed due to deferred maintenance?
You need airconditioning to get down to 27,7°C? Damn, I really feel sorry for you know. I was crying when my room had 26°C without airconditioning last night, but your temperatures are way higher! O.o
82° Fahrenheit = 27.7 ° Celsius. That's not a temperature where you can sleep well in.
and Cruz will blame his wife and children because they want to see snow in June.
Heading to some cooler areas where he can be the jerk he always is without risking a heat stroke.
Ted Cruz just changed his travelling plans and is heading to the North Pole to spite you.
Not to worry, Texas solution this September is to allow everyone to carry firearms without a permit or training.
They need the guns to stop women from getting abortions.
And to threaten the electricity back into the power lines
They don't stop women, especially their young precious daughters, from getting an abortion. They simply send them to visit an out of state aunt.
The woosh of the bullets will cool you. If you're shot dead, that works too and you eventually cool off.
ah perfect solution--if I'm dead I won't be too hot! Well, once we get to november, anyways.
You'll only cool to ambient temperature though.
"We learned our lesson during the winter!" ~not texas power provider
For context: the Texas Interconnection grid is mostly detached from the two larger grids in the US for, well, not really sound reasons. This makes it prone to instability in cases were either demand (like now or in cold winter) or supply (like when there is much wind, the wind power production was 20% in 2019, so there must be much capacity) get into an imbalance. From an engineering standpoint, the power grids in North America are ridiculously bad. The System Average Interruption Duration Index (SAIDI) for central European countries – with interconnected state grids – is about 10-30 minutes a year. The US figure is about 300! Undoubtedly, this is not due to a lack of engineering prowess but of political will to do somethign about it.
TLDR: Texans are so frothingly against "government" that they don't realize they're hurting themselves, and deregulation sucked. Also, yes, @Hans, our power grids are way out of date. That was being said in the 1980s, when Reagan and crew pushed deregulating.
I just found this: https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=45796 Apparently, some US states are very reliable, which, to explain the avarage (un)reliability, means that others are notoriously unrealiable. Maine had an average of 15 hours interruption (900 minutes). Yikes!
Maine skews its average quite a bit because of its population distribution, relatively few people with great distances between them contribute to longer outages as a result of damage. The last time I experienced a power interruption that wasn't a result of maintenance work on the infrastructure itself was in Feb. 2007 when large portions of my area were affected by a massive ice storm that took down many many local lines. It took nearly 7 days to get power back. Utility crews descended on the area from all over the country. The crew who ultimately reconnected my power was all the way from Alabama (to Illinois). More than 2000 miles of transmission lines needed replacing, along with more than 5000 utility poles.
"Not really sound reasons" is a delightful euphemism for "someone wanted to make a sh1t ton of money by deregulating it and not giving two flying ducks about the future or the poor people it will hurt".
the reason is this is Big Oil country, and interstate commerce laws make Texas oil cheaper to other states than we pay for it ourselves. So Texas power grid is separate and lags behind in solar and wind power, so they can keep the oil in state for higher price.
The problem is, in Texas anyway, is that if you drop a letter and add a letter SAIDI becomes Saudi and they'll have none of that THANK YOU VERY MUCH!.
America does not understand spending priorities. If you have enough guns everything will work out is the prevailing philosophy (yep I'm American)
Yes, but we also get hurricanes that knock down powerlines and stuff. And tornadoes. And fast moving bushfires. How often does Europe get hurricanes, tornadoes, and bushfires? I'm not defending Texas - Texas can f**k right off. But the rest of the country doesn't usually lose power for no reason. Power companies will frequently cut power during a hurricane so that the inevitable damage doesn't leave too many live wires zapping everything in the storm. Similarly, they might do rolling outages in heat waves with very dry weather so that the power stations don't start fires. Anyway if you're going to compare us to anyone, it should be Australia.
Australia has a SAIDI of 200 minutes and a reliability of 99.998%. That's the average for the country. I imagine a lot of that comes from outages due to wildfires and hurricanes.
Exactly. The thing is that to be fair, Abbott has very little power (no pun intended) to do much about the national grid's weaknesses. All he can do is encourage ERCOT to improve the grid in TX, which takes both time and money. I think the political will is there, but the means are not...yet. So placing the blame on him for a situation he did not create and can not fix is a bit unfair. That said, I do often wonder why more Texans are not going off the grid entirely via solar. Particularly in the west, that would seem like a no-brainer.
@First Name Last Name: You are wondering why they don't do more solar in Texas? You do realize that it is a HUGE oil state, right? Lots of people in the Dallas-Ft Worth area who literally made their fortunes in oil. In Texas they: 1) don't accept change easily 2)don't want to give up the money oil brings in 3) have lots of politicians and voters who don't believe climate change is a thing, or that oil production contributes to it. That you seem to have such a grip on the issues with the Texas power grid but not a grip on the attitude about how to generate energy there has me confused.
He's off the national grid. He's got his own Texas grid.
Not to worry, Texas solution this September is to allow everyone to carry firearms without a permit or training.
They need the guns to stop women from getting abortions.
And to threaten the electricity back into the power lines
They don't stop women, especially their young precious daughters, from getting an abortion. They simply send them to visit an out of state aunt.
The woosh of the bullets will cool you. If you're shot dead, that works too and you eventually cool off.
ah perfect solution--if I'm dead I won't be too hot! Well, once we get to november, anyways.
You'll only cool to ambient temperature though.
"We learned our lesson during the winter!" ~not texas power provider
For context: the Texas Interconnection grid is mostly detached from the two larger grids in the US for, well, not really sound reasons. This makes it prone to instability in cases were either demand (like now or in cold winter) or supply (like when there is much wind, the wind power production was 20% in 2019, so there must be much capacity) get into an imbalance. From an engineering standpoint, the power grids in North America are ridiculously bad. The System Average Interruption Duration Index (SAIDI) for central European countries – with interconnected state grids – is about 10-30 minutes a year. The US figure is about 300! Undoubtedly, this is not due to a lack of engineering prowess but of political will to do somethign about it.
TLDR: Texans are so frothingly against "government" that they don't realize they're hurting themselves, and deregulation sucked. Also, yes, @Hans, our power grids are way out of date. That was being said in the 1980s, when Reagan and crew pushed deregulating.
I just found this: https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=45796 Apparently, some US states are very reliable, which, to explain the avarage (un)reliability, means that others are notoriously unrealiable. Maine had an average of 15 hours interruption (900 minutes). Yikes!
Maine skews its average quite a bit because of its population distribution, relatively few people with great distances between them contribute to longer outages as a result of damage. The last time I experienced a power interruption that wasn't a result of maintenance work on the infrastructure itself was in Feb. 2007 when large portions of my area were affected by a massive ice storm that took down many many local lines. It took nearly 7 days to get power back. Utility crews descended on the area from all over the country. The crew who ultimately reconnected my power was all the way from Alabama (to Illinois). More than 2000 miles of transmission lines needed replacing, along with more than 5000 utility poles.
"Not really sound reasons" is a delightful euphemism for "someone wanted to make a sh1t ton of money by deregulating it and not giving two flying ducks about the future or the poor people it will hurt".
the reason is this is Big Oil country, and interstate commerce laws make Texas oil cheaper to other states than we pay for it ourselves. So Texas power grid is separate and lags behind in solar and wind power, so they can keep the oil in state for higher price.
The problem is, in Texas anyway, is that if you drop a letter and add a letter SAIDI becomes Saudi and they'll have none of that THANK YOU VERY MUCH!.
America does not understand spending priorities. If you have enough guns everything will work out is the prevailing philosophy (yep I'm American)
Yes, but we also get hurricanes that knock down powerlines and stuff. And tornadoes. And fast moving bushfires. How often does Europe get hurricanes, tornadoes, and bushfires? I'm not defending Texas - Texas can f**k right off. But the rest of the country doesn't usually lose power for no reason. Power companies will frequently cut power during a hurricane so that the inevitable damage doesn't leave too many live wires zapping everything in the storm. Similarly, they might do rolling outages in heat waves with very dry weather so that the power stations don't start fires. Anyway if you're going to compare us to anyone, it should be Australia.
Australia has a SAIDI of 200 minutes and a reliability of 99.998%. That's the average for the country. I imagine a lot of that comes from outages due to wildfires and hurricanes.
Exactly. The thing is that to be fair, Abbott has very little power (no pun intended) to do much about the national grid's weaknesses. All he can do is encourage ERCOT to improve the grid in TX, which takes both time and money. I think the political will is there, but the means are not...yet. So placing the blame on him for a situation he did not create and can not fix is a bit unfair. That said, I do often wonder why more Texans are not going off the grid entirely via solar. Particularly in the west, that would seem like a no-brainer.
@First Name Last Name: You are wondering why they don't do more solar in Texas? You do realize that it is a HUGE oil state, right? Lots of people in the Dallas-Ft Worth area who literally made their fortunes in oil. In Texas they: 1) don't accept change easily 2)don't want to give up the money oil brings in 3) have lots of politicians and voters who don't believe climate change is a thing, or that oil production contributes to it. That you seem to have such a grip on the issues with the Texas power grid but not a grip on the attitude about how to generate energy there has me confused.
He's off the national grid. He's got his own Texas grid.