Snow covers the ground in Waco, Texas as severe winter weather conditions over the last few days has ... [+]
The chairman and four directors of ERCOT, the agency that runs Texas' electricity grid, have resigned after the grid failed catastrophically during a cold snap that swept through the state and left millions without power for days last week, according to a filing.
The fallout comes as the toll of the extreme cold grows clearer. Dozens of people died after power plants in the typically warm-weather state went offline because they had failed to weatherize key infrastructure such as gas pipelines. Days after the first outages, tens of thousands of Texans remained without power.
In a letter addressed February 23rd to board members of the Electricity Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), four of the directors wrote that they have "noted recent concerns about out-of-state board leadership at ERCOT."
They added: "To allow state leaders a free hand with future direction and to eliminate distractions, we are resigning from the board effective after our urgent board teleconference meeting adjourns on Wednesday, February 24, 2021."
The resignations of the five directors — board chairman Sally Talberg and vice chairman Peter Cramton, plus Terry Bulger, Raymond Hepper, and Vanessa Anesetti-Parra — will become effective tomorrow when ERCOT convenes a special board meeting conference.
As of January 1st, ERCOT's board had 15 directors with one seat vacant.
Federal agencies that oversee the U.S. electricity sector have announced investigations of the historic failure of many of the state's power plants. Last week the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and a counterpart, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC), said in a joint statement they would look into "the operations of the bulk-power system during the extreme winter weather conditions currently being experienced by the Midwest and South central states." That investigation was set to begin within days.
Unlike other states, Texas operates its power grid independently, which allows it to avoid some federal regulation but also constrains its ability to import power and gas during emergencies. Even if it had retained the ability to do so, however, the extent of the outages would likely have remained widespread, as even other states suffered widespread if less serious power outages.
The filing was made on the website of the Public Utility Commission of Texas. Bloomberg earlier reported the news.
