The Hill: Lawsuits allege deadly 2021 Texas blackouts were an inside job
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- Опубликовано: 28 сен 2024
- Those deadly blackouts that killed hundreds of people during the 20-21 winter storm may have been an inside job. A new lawsuit alleges energy companies created an artificial natural gas shortage. KXAN's Tom Miller talked to The Hill reporter Saul Elbein about the other claims made in the suit.
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I suspected this in 2021. As an electrician some of the claims they were making made no sense. Saying the electrical equipment could not handle the cold. Then jacking up the price by thousands of dollars per customer. Complete scam!
In all fairness an electrician is no more qualified to speak on matters of civil and petroleum engineering than a hairdresser is. I am an electrical engineer. I have no applied knowledge of the reliability of pneumatic valves at variable temperatures, atmospheric pressures, and dew points. My opinion would matter if the issue occurred at or downstream of the generator. That is not where the problem manifested.
I remember a blackout around NYC & NJ that was later discovered to have been greed. Not during a cold spell though. Seems like it was in the '90s.
@@zbubby1202the appeal to authority fallacy, often called the "expert fallacy" or appeal to exclusive expertise. In this case, someone might argue that you can't understand or criticize a particular idea or claim unless you're an expert in the field. This shuts down meaningful discussion and suggests that only those with specialized knowledge have the right to evaluate the claim.
While expertise can provide valuable insight, it doesn't mean non-experts are incapable of understanding or questioning certain aspects. Dismissing an argument simply because the other person lacks specific credentials is often a way to avoid engaging with the actual evidence or reasoning.
For example:
"You haven't studied economics, so you can't possibly understand why this policy will work."
This tactic assumes that specialized knowledge is a shield against scrutiny, which undermines healthy debate and critical thinking.
@@harmonizedigital. Great post. Cheers!
@@zbubby1202 sounds like you like to fluff your ego zombie
So: who will be prosecuted? What’s that? No one? Yep.
Haitian migrants
Abbott won't let his buddies get prosecuted. They all made a shitload of money together. Then, they did it again.
Capitalism, baby.
This is Texas, so Abbot and Paxton likely were in on it.
Welcome to capitalism!
Enron did this to California.
Enron helped design the Texas electricity market rules and structure.
I remember when
With assistance from President Bush & team.
There's three main sections of the natoinal grid. Texas disconnected from the main US grid because they did not want federal regulations.
Excellent investigative work and thanks for reporting to public. Don’t trust private business and neither Abbott. Greed and still gouging Texans
Is there any investigative reporting, though? They're just discussing and reporting on the allegations in a lawsuit. That's a matter of public record, and I don't see that the reporters did any deep digging to uncover facts beyond the claims in the lawsuit. Of course you shouldn't trust people who are enriched when they can pick your pocket and get away with it, but that doesn't make the claims here the result of "investigative work".
Your support for illegal immigration is duly noted! Go back to New York!
How is Abbot at fault?
Legislation was passed in 2022 to address the original problem. The oil company showered Abbot with cash to weaken ir.
@@waskerbasket9601follow the money.
Greed-driven murder. Nothing new here.
On the part of the Pipeline Analytics Company which turns out to be .CirclesX LLC a SimpsX Technologies LLC / Texans Helping Texans . This appears to be a predatory l;aw firm that sues energy companies to generate $$$ for themselves.
Texas residents have been paying a surcharge since 2011 after the LAST major snow storm… This fee is called an “Upgrade Fee”.
Every month, every resident, for 10 years…
Where did that money go????
So someone is going to jail for manslaughter right or because the companies are rich they just get to pay money.
It would be higher than manslaughter
Speaking the truth.
That's the funny thing about capitalism. It values business more than people. It's okay if people die as long as the money still flows. Somehow, most Americans think this is OK🤷♂️
They will say it’s the cost of doing business
Exactly, if they are going to treat business as people in every other aspect, they should do they same when it comes to the consequences. All too often they get a slap on the wrist and a fine that we the consumers end up paying for in the end anyways, and the company is then all clear to continue on doing the same thing over and over again. It has to stop, they need to be held accountable!
We watched the companies prepare and winterize several months before this happened....it was premeditated.
Yay capitalism, right? Somebody made a lot of money, and those who passed were commies.
No, they did not prepare and the problem is not fixed.
Remember when Enron was telling its power producers in California to go offline for maintenance so that they could jack up the prices due to an engineered shortage -- seems the Texas energy companies remembered!
People died, pets, livestock and wildlife. Along with price increases etc.
5 days without phones, power, and frozen pipes that busted. It was horrible
Republikkkns made lots of money, and increased prices!
Worse. My city didn't have clean drinking water for more than a week. (Water treatment plants require electricity to function!)
@@robd5254 I don't recall making any money.
@jeanniestegner9915 sorry your the donor to billionaires!
@robd5254 Right, your theory is everyone that votes republican is guilty?
So if they find Democrats guilty, we can charge everyone that voted democratic? Asinine !
People killing deregulation
The ERCOT board should’ve been in a lawsuit long ago!!! They just resigned and bailed on Texas just like Cruz!
That is pure evil.
Um, there is no "time line" on bringing charges for murder!
This is what happens with loose regulation, the customer gets screwed , companies get rich , politicians get campaign contributions.
Deregulation is the ultimate goal for republicans because they are loyal to corporations. It started with Ronald Reagan and it’s only gotten worse.
I would say it's exactly the opposite, far too much regulation.
And workers licensed and apprentices in training get killed or even survive and live to speak up about it.
When are you people going to learn how to vote in your own interests.
😂😂😂😂 everything is bigger in Texas; including the stupidity!!!!
So you’re maga? I mean, trump was YOUR president for four years, why would you vote against your own interests like that? Kick rocks.
Ted Cruz will get to the bottom of this as soon as he gets back from Cancun.
@@midcenturymoldyHaha 😂I
@midcenturymoldy I remember him throwing his daughters under the bus when confronted about that trip. If my memory serves correctly, didn't he leave their family dog home alone in the house to possibly perrish in the cold?
You mean Texans can't go on vacations? You think Cruz could magically thaw out Texas? Thousands of Texans were on vacation during the big freeze. So it's their fault as well huh😐
@@ThaddMitchell2112 He blamed everyone including his wife. I thought Texans didn’t take this type of crap.
I am voting him out on election day.🌊🌊
Capitalism functioning as intended.
Exactly
The alternatives are all 500% worse. Look at north korea
Its not capitalism when theres only 1 natural gas company in the market
Red state values! 🟥
Yep, profits before people
Democrats have no room to talk look at California 😂
I dunno, my red state's oil men have no problem operating through actual winters. Texas only received a small taste of winter.
Prison time for all involved
Yep, not necessarily preplanned but when the power companies started shedding load, the first loads shed were to the gas processing plants and oil fields in West Texas. They shut off their own fuel supply. The "Grid" was fine. The problem was with the electric power generators.
No the gas lines froze.
@@Artcurus Very few did. I work for a pipeline company. We receive the bulk of our gas from gas processing plants. Their power was shut off and we lost our supply. We had to depend on what we had in storage.
@paulkurilecz4209 Read my former post more carefully. Oilfield blogs were talking about the ice clots. Parts of West Texas did not lose power, ironically parts of the city of Crane didn't. The first load sheds were heavy industrial, though by Feb 14, most had already shut down. It makes no sense for Oilfield infrastructure for load shedding when, in this case, it was vital to keep things going. They would been prioritized. Around 2am, on Feb 14, too many power gens had tripped offline because of lack of fuel. The load quickly outstripped the available supply, causing the grid to get dangerously unstable. Everything on the grid depends on a resonate frequency, EVERYTHING, and that frequency cannot vary by as little as 1%. If it does, very bad things happen, like pole transformers catching fire. Residential load shedding began at 3am on Feb 14. and was done to protect the grid.
@@paulkurilecz4209 The power gens were not fine. Read my other post more carefully. You could observe in real time what was happening as the power gens started shutting down because of lack of fuel, and the avilable supply dropped. The demand outstripped the supply and caused the grid to become unstable. The grid runs on a resonate frequency, that frequency cannot vary by more than 1% or very bad things happen. The recovery would taken months and ERCOT had to do what they do had to to stop that happening. By Feb 14, most major industries had already shut down voluntarily. Oil field equipment such those compressors would not have been included because they are major infrastructure. The exception would have been pumpjacks. On Feb 14, by 2am, the supply of electricity reached critical levels, residential load shedding began at 3am.
Something was very suspicious about this outage.
They DIED. We all almost LITERALLY DIED. I lived like this for 7 DAYS. FREEZING TO DEATH.
I hear they only shut off the democrat neighborhoods.
@@smokingjoe9864 I lived in college station, Texas during this time.
@@smokingjoe9864 I don’t know how much more republican you can get.
I almost died. It was 23° in my house, ice on the floors, my dish soap froze. There was nothing rolling about those blackouts! My neighborhood would get power for EXACTLY thirty minutes a day, but which 30 minutes was anyone’s guess. I will never forget or forgive.
Sorry to hear that. I felt so bad when I heard when it was happening. I started getting ready in case that happens in Bay Area.
Put the blame where it belongs... The governor
💯
This sounds like a repeat of Enron
Vulture Capitalism in the energy industry
Texas doesn’t have capitalism governing the electric grid sector. There’s a monopoly. Corporate communist I would call it!
Abbott the snowman probably new about it!
Poppa Wheelies?
Republican love for the masses.
Leave it to a supporter of illegal immigration to blame Republicans!
Wonder how much Abbott made off it?
Enough to upgrade to all terrain wheels…
That's just disgusting!
Republicans privatized our electric grid in 1994. Preventive maintenance was ignored as was weatherization. (You've got to think of the shareholders, first - _not consumers_ ... 🥀
Democrats think "The State" should own and control everything, just like in Russia!
Yet they charged a maintenance fee on all our bills. Where did that money go exactly since clearly it didn’t go to maintenance?
Enron* 2.0??
How can we follow this case? Or will this be the last we hear about it? The question at this point is what was done to mitigate the root cause and prevent this from happening in the future. If nothing measurable was done and ercot says that this won't happen again, someone needs to pay for what was done.
The whole system is rigged
If true it is murder.
OMG, just no. The Feb 2021 fiasco was traced to two specific natural gas compressors in West Texas. One in Crane County and one in Crockett County just outside of Ozona. The control systems and support piping were never winterized, ice clots formed inside the pipes and the compressors shut down. There's pictures of these ice clots. As the supply of natural gas began to taper off, the power gens started shutting down one by one. This caused the supply of electricity to drop off and there was too much load, and the grid became unstable. The Texas government knew in 2012 this problem existed and tried to pass legislation to force the oil companies to winterized their equipment, but it deemed "too expensive" Legislation was passed in 2022 but Abbot was shoewered with cash to weaken it. The problem has not been fixed.
So what was Abbot's et al cut?
This will all end up costing taxpayers millions in legal fees while the energy companies cry, “oopsie” and get themselves a meaningless oopsie fine.
Justice is blind. That should also mean that one party cannot use legal tricks to circumvent justice.
Similar to the Enron artificial electricity shortages in Cali
Food, infrastructure, power, coal, gas, oil, hospitals, internet phone and water all of these things should be owned by the federal government properly for profit put back into us funds rather then allowing foreign companies to own our roads power plants, coal mines, steel factories, recycling centers, etc etc.
Yeah thats whst we need more unchecked federal gov power,
💯
If government is the answer, it must have been a really stupid question.
Yes COMRADE!!! Communism for ALL!
This is what happens when utility companies aren't regulated by the federal government. People pay the price with their lives. Those who survive pay dearly out of pocket.
If that is true, they should bankrupt them damn companies for doing price bidding, and bid rigging
Everyone knew that. I'm surprised they got enough proof to sue.
This is what big companies do. Whenever there’s a crisis, they find a way to rip people off and blame it on the crisis.
Even if the allegations in the lawsuit are eventually proven not 'true', the court MUST let this proceed just for the CRITCAL IMPORTANCE of presenting fact and truth about that entire horrible debacle ....and then Texas can move on.
Comment from San Diego, California:
No discussion of wellhead freeze offs - which would be projected by any serious operator, including pipelines. This is garbage journalism/lawsuit. Period.
If texas rangers aren't rounding up some folks, you all done lost your balls.
They need to be prosecuted ASAP!!!! innocent people died all bc yall wanted to shut off the gas and sell it is crazy
Robbers
Enron anyone?
if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and looks like a duck... it's probably a duck...
Lol 😂 who knew?
We knew it
It is also about time that ERCOT must be decommissioned and shut down and put Texas on the rest of the National Electrical Grid.
Oh you would love that, because then the democrats/government would control ALL of the electricity...just like in Russia!
America's business IS business..... are you happy yet??? More tax cuts will definitely help? 🇺🇲1775🇺🇲 America, remember ❓
My heart is already Frozen I'm packing go to the hole winner
Republicans, under Greg Abbott got rich, while the poor suffered and died,
Nothing but Greed.
These utilities should be public. Same in California.
I walk down P&IDS. I am out of Colorado and Wyoming. Having walked down sites in Texas (in winter) I fully believe it was a winterization issue. Zero surprise from me during Texas's small taste of winter.
How the FARK did 247 people die when a winter storm rolled through the “most modern” country in the world? It was barely below freezing…how bad is the housing in TX?
Barely below freezing??? I think you have no idea how cold it was. It was -10 where i lived. And most of Texas was like that.
But also, the housing is not built like it is up North. Less insulated, fewer firelAlso, I think quite a few homeless die.
There was no electricity. Furnaces, even gas ones, don't work without electricity.
@@midcenturymoldyYou know what DOES work without electricity?
Generators. Many have them up here (for sump pumps). Texas, not so much.
I mean, it's a place where e
EVERYTHING shuts down for less than ¼" of frost!
@@MomMom4CubsSo, people up north start dropping like flies when the temperature get over 85 degrees and they don’t have an AC blowing right in their face AND directly on their ass! 😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣
BlackRock is invested. Think about that.
Unless Executives go to prison nothing will change
Negligence of the possible outcomes of this predatory capitalism is criminal. If citizens united made corporations people, they should do the time just like a real person.
If found guilty, there will be a small fine. They were only human lives, afterall.
All those politicians there in Texas were saying it was because of the windmills......
Yikes!!! There's corporate greed, and then there's what's either deliberate negligence or malice.
I wonder were Ted Cruz is on this subject? My best guess, hiding in Cancun again.
Wow. If Abbott wants reelection he needs to step up or get ready to step out
Walker Shirley Thomas Steven Young Larry
I KNEW IT. IM NOT CRAZY. IM NOT CRAZYYY!!
Oh LORDY!!!! This is kinda like, "ENRON, THE SMARTEST GUY IN THE ROOM" ... oh man!!!
Everybody knows the dice are loaded. Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed.
To litigate in a corrupted system (ERCOT and Texas Gov't) will take time, but must be done. This doesn't change my 'no-confidence' vote for the Texas gov't.
Thomas Edward Gonzalez Charles Clark Paul
Abbotts Corrupt Texas 😂😂😂😂.
Good ole Texas. Serves them right for having their own poorly managed grid.
I can’t forget that storm .. I remember winter storm hit Texas very bad ..a lot texans complained about power shortage yet some get crazy bills ..delays and deaths ..pipes frozen and water is gone ..power grids went out yet they profit a lot amounts from crazy bills ?
Ask the director of the Denton power authority. Simple.
Money grab, just like when gas prices doubled towards the end of George W’s presidency
Dear Texass;
VOTE DEMOCRAT
again like when your stuff worked!
Signed, Arizona
Texas has NEVER been democrat ruled!
@@justdoingitjim7095check your “fact”. You’re so wrong that it’s comical.
Maryland agrees 👍
How did 100s die? You want to end this forever, freedom is always the answer. Any homeowner can choose to leave the grid, that fixes everything.
Good ole Texas! Instead of adjusting for climate fluctuations, it’s everyone for themselves and we will bill ya later… excuse me I have a plane to catch.
They know they acknowledge and nothing happens thats justice in Texas.
Rediculous! No one can control Mother Nature.
justice in this country doesn't exist
Your Texas Governor and Senators allowed the companies to get away with that.
Vote Blue!
Infowars showed the documents proving it was intentional
Allen Jose Garcia Maria Jackson Christopher
Thank you Ted Cruz for doing absolutely nothing worst governor ever .
Why wouldn't a for-profit company take advantage of an opportunity to make more profit?
The governor would just hand out pardons regardless.
Wow! Will big energy Companies stoop too anything chasing that almighty buck.
The governor is complicit.
Bring back the Blood Avenger!
From the governor on down to all other republicans ..
Effing bastards. Not surprising. I've long suspected various companies of doing things like that, such as those refineries that suddenly have "issues" or God forbid explosions that kill just in time to raise prices through the roof.
Huge surprise, and why wouldn’t they? They get away with everything.
If that's the case and if found guilty, the ceo's and owners need too be sued and put in jail
Allegation? they were openly talking about it as it happened, it was on the news, prices skyrocketed and the gas companies made bank then permanently raised prices.