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Texas to receive $60 million from U.S. Department of Energy to strengthen electric grid (Austin American-Statesman)
The Texas Division of Emergency Management will receive $60.6 million from the U.S. Department of Energy to strengthen the state’s power grid infrastructure in preparation for future extreme weather.
The Energy Department announced Thursday that the grant would help Texas identify gaps in grid resilience and minimize grid disruption through weatherization and modeling technologies. The state will also ensure that any new measures can be operated without contractor support if possible, according to the department’s announcement.
The funding comes more than two years after the state’s electricity grid came near to total collapse in February 2021 due to severe winter weather, causing prolonged blackouts for millions of Texans and hundreds of deaths.
The U.S. and Texas are also expect to see more record-breaking summer temperatures, driven partially by human-caused climate change, which will test the state’s grid.
“Renewable energy has helped many parts of the country withstand a crippling heat dome, and the President’s Investing in America agenda will increase the amount of clean power sources available on the nation’s grid,” U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm said in a news release. “… These grants will help modernize the electric grid to reduce impacts of extreme weather and natural disasters while enhancing power sector reliability.”
More: ‘She was my everything’: A chaotic week of preventable deaths in Austin as Texas froze
The Texas Division of Emergency Management did not respond to an American-Statesman request for comment about its plans for distributing the funds or what the money will be used for.
The new funding is part of a $207.6 million grant that the federal government provided to nine states and three tribal nations to help reduce the effects of extreme weather on electrical grids and ensure power sector reliability, according to the U.S. Energy Department.
Over the next five years, the federal government plans to distribute $2.3 billion in Grid Resilience State and Tribal Formula Grants to states, territories and federally recognized tribes to address clean and affordable energy through funding from the federal 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.
Since the 2021 winter storm, Texas lawmakers have passed legislation aimed at addressing energy production within the state, including establishing billions in low-interest loans for gas power plant construction. Officials who oversee the grid have also taken steps to address its resiliency.
Texans have remained concerned about the electric grid over the past two years as severe weather events have tested its reliability, including recent sweltering summer heat and an ice storm in February that left thousands of people in Austin without power for days largely due to downed power lines. The grid has held up so far.
As Texas faces a growing population and future extreme weather events, energy experts told the Statesman that the new federal grant will not be enough on its own to help maintain the grid’s reliability, but it will help make a small difference.
“By itself, is $60 million going to be determinative to make our grid reliable? Of course not,” said Doug Lewin, president of Austin-based energy consulting company Stoic Energy. “It’ll cost more than that, but every bit counts, and $60 million is not a small amount of money, so (the state) could probably do a lot of good with that.”
