blackouts. the future of us energy policy and lessons learned from the winter 2021 texas power outage and i know they're going to talk about the global crisis as well. i'm going to introduce the panel moderator and they will come onto the stage and she will introduce the panelists. jackie deason's post of the jackie daily show which educates entertains and engages america on all things energy. you really should check out her podcast. wherever you find your podcast you will find the jackie daily show. it airs sundays on the blaze.com radio and on the dial in texas each saturday and as i mentioned the podcasts are weekly which you can find on i heart radio, ouwherever you get your podcast. jackie was previously a senior fellow at the public policy foundation and also served as general counsel to an engineering firm is lysing in energy, national security and environmental cleanup. she served as legal counsel on capitol hill to the chairman of the subcommittee on the constitution and former ranking committee ranking member of the commercial and administrative law subcommittee advising on the oversight of federal agencies . jackie studied economics, spanish and world history marshall university. oxford university university of zaragoza in spain. she is an alumna of vanderbilt university law school where she served as president of the law school federalist society chapter. jackie hasan extensive network from sheet which she draws guests for the jackie daily show including industry leaders representing all parts of theenergy sector , government officials , journalists and political insiders often jackie will know today's most wanted yes and be able to secure the guests with a personal call and i can testify she already knew and had interviewed the speakers we have here today. jackie is from the ohio river valley the shield wednesday. she descends from a long line of energy workers including roughnecks, railroaders, coal miners and nuclear energy specialists. follow jackie at jackie daily post on twitter. let's give a warm welcome to our panel. >>. [music] >> if you'll all take seat. sit this down before i get started. all right, my honor and pleasure to introduce our guest robert bryce. behind me. >> there is. he is go producer of the documentaryjuice which aired here last night . electricity explains the world. robert is a texas state author, podcast or, old producer and public speaker with over three decades his articles have appeared in the wall street enjournal, new york times,national review, field and stream and the austin chronicle . the documentary i mentioned he produced along with tyson kohler released in mid-2020 and is not available on numerous streaming platforms. these published six books, the most recent a question of power: electricity and the wealth of nations and spent 12 yearsas a for the austin chronicle . 2006 through 2010 he was managing editor of the energy tribune at 2010 through 2019 a senior fellow at the manhattan institute. he lives in austin with his wife lauren. who is an art teacher, photographer and master potter. on this side is blue holy from continental resources, vice president of hsd. he is responsible for strategic leadership of corporate hsd and esg programs with corporate policy and regulatory initiatives and these past chairman of f the north dakota petroleum council currently serves as chair of the petroleum alliance of oklahoma, board member of domestic energy producers alliance, counsel for secure america and oklahoma city national memorial museum. i needed oklahoma and he has degrees from oklahoma state and university of. . [applause] >> i guess they'll do. good afternoon. i want to talk about what happened in texas and this is a personal story for me. my wife lauren ishere last february 15 we were blacked out for 45 hours we talked about why that happened . what i'm going to address i'd advise my slide deck a few minutes ago after hearing andrew's comments'with alex epstein and then i'm going to talk about the eu and what has happened in the eu because those cases are very important because they are so similar. okay, so i'm not going to read this slide to you. i'll let you read it. 700 people died, not all of them because of lack of electricity but i want to underscore this point. the grid came this close from a complete meltdown. bill magnus said on february 25 in the emergency board of directors meeting the gridwas about 4 and a half minutes from a completeshutdown . think for just a minute , 26 million texans plunged into darkness when it was snowing sideways and temperatures were falling and you couldn't travel. theroads were impassable . had that happened texas would have had a mass mortality event. it wouldn't have been 700 peopledied, maybe hundreds of thousands of people died . and it would have had ramifications throughout the rest of the country because texas i'm from oklahoma, i'm not yourwriting about texas . texas accounts for about 10 percent of everything in america. population, gdp but for food, fuel, transportation it was a critical state and if the system had gone black getting it restarted after going system black would have been effectively impossible not just four days perhaps four weeks . it would have caused nationwide recession. so let's be clear about the stakes here and about what almost happened because of mismanagement ofthe texas grid . okay, so the key point here, what is the key. after the disaster of all kinds of reports cannot. a lot of academics saying don't blame renewables and those silly republicans down there they're saying renewables were partly to o cost for this. yes, absolutely. 66 billion. these are screen grabs. these are screen grabs from the wind industry lobbies on website. their own numbers say a proximally 63 billion. iadded in and asked to april 20, 2021 . $56 billion n. spent on the wind and solar in the years before the blackouts. why did they spend 66 billion, because they got $22 billion in subsidies. data from bill peacock was done the analysis. what kind of other business would you get into if you had a third of the money you spent in the form of subsidies so what did that mean, you see a massive change ingeneration because of the subsidies . hello. wind energy increases by a about 20 percent. coal declined by 20 percent. net gas stays flat, solar rises a little bit. the other thing that is never mentioned and i do mean never . not in texas, not in new york times, not in these other publications but in the years before the blackouts six gigawatts, 6.2 gigawatts of coal-fired capacity was retired under pressure from the sierra club environmental groups but you don't hear that. that's not discussed because it doesn't fit thenarrative . so what's driving this? d why again did this happen? because of federal subsidies are driving the investment in her cot as well as the rest of the grid in the united states. so simple graphic, the only kind i can make. probably the holiest slide will see all they. this is congressional research service data that i imagined with bp data pointing out on a per unit of energy produced basis, i've denominated it in exit jewels, i can put in gallons of oil equivalent . roughly 1 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. if you don't know your si units you should. but the denominator is the same. the dollars per unit of energy produced basis the solar industry is getting 250 times more enteral tax than the nuclear sector . wind industry something like i haven't done the math lately but those hydrocarbon guys there cashing in when it comes to federal cash credits . the numbers don't supportthat . this is the story and we didn't hear it from professor dressler talking about the subsidies driving solar and wind. i hear it's cheaper. i can't control mygag reflex over there . okay. this is the slide that more than any other explains what happened. this is the slide that art berman created part graciously allowed me to use it . i'm going to walk over here. so what happened? this is january 30 in texas. so the wind was blowing and what happens, wind drives out natural gas it drives out cold. and that's what wind does. when wind is blowing it reducesthe amount of gas on the htsystem . but then look right here. february 15, when my lights went out. what happened? solar and wind disappeared, $66 billion on wind and solar and they went to cancun with ted cruz. gone. disappeared. went on vacation but don't blame us. it's not our fault. it's the gas guys. really the gas guys to almost 0 on january 30 they go to about 50, i don't know, 40,000 megawatts in a span of a few hours. and they're the ones to blame. it's not true. it is just not true another screen grab. exactly 6 months to the day after my lights went out. screen grab from website t. here's february 15. warns of power shortage. four months to the day. wind when we had a hot that day. in austin throughout texas. power demand is at 70,000 megawatts, about what was every 15 when they started load shedding . wind goes tozero . that's not the only one. this is just earlier last month. again, high power demand at 50,000megawatts. wind again to almost 0 . again and again. they're not required to provide power when power is geared. and therein is the rub. and doctor kessler said will just what he was saying is you have to subsidize the thermal generators to come into the market when there needed. so that the wind and solar guys can free ride and that's the right word on the thermal generators. mckenzie, their report. you don't have to believe me one of the most respected energy consultants in the world . their analysis in december, what do they say, the worst of the columns occurred during an extended wind drought. and i heard this, will just build more transitional. it will come to that. but it was over ercot for 12 days. a lot of people say there's gas, there was a lot of gas se run down. the availability of gas prior to the blackouts fell. it did because the wind wasn't blowing and what did they say as the share of wind power rises coal and gas decline managing the grid to maintain supply is important . hello. i'm not a paid consultant but i can agree with that one. but these market deficiencies are the leading contributor to making the ercot is less reliable . they're saying the market is being distorted by federal subsidies. i just showed you that slide but it gets worse.this is data from ercot's website on their additions to the ercot grid between now and the end of next year. that's nearly equal to all the existing solar in california today. the amount of combined cycle gas beingadded is effectively zero .bu these business guys are sharp . they know they can't make money at ercot, they're not th going to build a power plant that will pay back the money. they can't get lending from banks to do it. banks will say how do youmake your return on investment ? holy graph, only kind i can make we could have 72 gigawatts of wind and solar. that's more than the combined capacity of every gas-fired generation in texas. we are preparing for a disaster that's potentially even worse than the one we just narrowly avoided. so what do we know? >> .. if those insurers prevailed and it appears they might because the dallas court of appeals judge ruled that ercot doesn't have sovereign immunity. what are they? are the a state entity or no state unity? i don't think they are a state entity. if they are who's going p to pay all the property and casualty losses? the personal injury losses, , lt the legislature steps in and says we are not paying anything. this is a mess and it's going to get worse. one of the of the key point is the gas grid in electric grids have merged but they're still regulated separately. shows you the slideha about the call on gas. if --as we retired all this coal and gas was assumed over, we have told you your the battery, we're not going to pay you to be the battery that you are the battery. when you don't show up we are going to people complain about you. but the problem is not fixed, not by a long shot. professor tesla is here, too bad. if you hear i wish he was sitting in the front row. it's cheaper. okay fine. my friend lee says there are three things when you're planning new addition to the grid, three things. where are you going to put it? how are you going to connect it? how do you pay for it? he didn't have one word like so many of the academics, these spreadsheet jockeys who produced these elaborate computerelod modules. we have a computer module. okay fine. maybe you ought to lead palo alto, m.i.t. andy cal berkeley and go to small towns in iowa or maybe spend time in rural california because in rural california in shasta which just rejected a big wind project. cherokee county kansas, san bernardino county california the largest county by area in america in 2019 and large-scale renewables if this is in the state of california which has 100% 100 clean and net zero goal by 2045. vermont isis listed. bernie sandf the biggest promoters of renewables in the senate. he ran in 2016 on a platform that said we went 100% renewable. so that's great. you can't build wind turbines in vermont? can't build them in new york. and you can't build them in, california. where you're going to put it, how are you going to connect it? how are you going to pay for it, but it's not just wind. it's solar two again this oh, well, the solar is cheaper. okay, fine. ignore uighur slave labor ignore the fact that the us state department just sanctioned the import of solar panels and poly silicon from xinjiang province. where 40% of the world's poly silicon for solar was being sourced. forget that you can still call your clean energy clean energy even though you got a little slave labor in there. we'll just ignore that. where you going to put it? i just made this slide just a few minutes ago. that tough thing from nbc news. they published that march 6th. i was like, yes. thank you. a big media outlet reporting on what's really happening on the ground in america. you won't read about this in the washington post. actually. they did a pretty good story the other day about a tall grass prairie in texas. you won't read about it in npr. i wrote a piece of colette i published monday. decrying they're terrible coverage of the renewable business. you won't read about the new york times the new york times will not cover the backlash against wind and solar in the state of new york. but the problem with solar the same problem with wind needs big footprints. can all across the country people are saying we don't want your stuff. how are you going to connect it? c3 group in atlanta, i finally got some good data on. high voltage transmission how much is actually being built? that third line we're building about 1700 miles of high voltage transmission, 230 kilovolts and above since 2008. the amount of interstate that is crossing state lines is a less than that far like 250 miles. but even if we grant you that's 1700 miles a year at current rates doubling high voltage transmission to get to 90% renewable electricity will take 140 years. and yet these phds i've just had it. i've had it. oh, well, we'll do it all with wind and solar. okay, fine. oh and we're just gonna double high voltage transmission. okay. well explain it to leave slowly because i'm from tulsa. you got to go slower with blue because he's from sky tube really really slow. how you gonna build it? if you think building pipelines and putting them in the ground is hard tried doing the same thing with electrical infrastructure. that's 150 feet or 200 feet high. state of iowa has passed a law prohibiting the use of imminent domain for high voltage transmission. all across the country rural communities are saying we don't want high voltage transmission across our property our county our town. the grid we have is largely the grid we're going to have so it's not just massive amounts of high voltage transmission. it's cartoonish amounts of land. my daughter mary made this slide for me. i quite like it just because it really pops. two different two different analyzes one by david keith and lee miller at harvard from 2018 botslav schmill. who's a savant on all these issues? meeting existing electricity demand with with wind alone. that's not the objective. nobody's proposing that would require two california's worth of land. to california's, you can't even build a single wind turbine in california and yet these these people are saying oh, yeah, we'll just do it again. we'll put it out there, you know in flyover country. eastern colorado, kansas, you know those trump voters out there. we'll put it out there. really? again, my slide data. i've been collecting since 2015 more than 323 communities from coast to coast from maine to hawaii have rejected a restricted wind projects. in the last eight years. wind industry has never challenged my numbers. they want to act like this doesn't exist. the facts are the facts. w edwards deming said it right and god. we trust everyone else bring data. i'm bringing data. this is the data. all of its sourced all of it with urls you can find it on my website. robert brice.com the renewable rejection database the solar advocates the wind advocates. they don't want to talk about this doesn't fit their narrative. this is the reality. okay, so what is all this doing? it's a piece i published in in forbes a few days ago. it's good for generacs bad for america and generac's own investor presentations. i know we have some ceos from publicly traded companies. you don't publish data on your website or in your public or public reports unless you know that it's true because if you publish false information you go to the hooscow, they're not sec's not very happy about that. what is generac saying about the increasing the declining reliability of the grid? they're pointing to renewables. but it's not just generac. the north american electric reliability corporation in august published their report you can see on that top another screen grab. look at that top line changing resource. mix they said is the most important issue in terms of the decline in reliability. and what else did they say? they said the same thing that would max said. wind droughts solar droughts our grid is increasingly characterized as one that sensitive to extreme widespread would max it was 12 days. this is the north american electric reliability corporation. they're the ones who are responsible for reliability. why would they publish it? why would generac say the same thing? why would nirk say this? because it's true. wind and solar cheaper. that's great. fine. i'll make might accept that except that they're bad for the grid. they're fragilizing our most important. energy network they're fragilizing as john constable says self-poisoning the energy network that all of our other most important networks depend upon it's a dangerous dangerous trend that we're facing in the united states. what happened in europe? to reuters headline wind droughts could talk all day long about russia and ukraine and i can't believe the thuggery. i can't believe the maliciousness the outright murderousness of this guy putin. disgusting but europe drove themselves into the ditch by over investing and renewables under investing in hydrocarbons closing base load power plants and relying to heavily on imports. it's the same thing. i said in front of the senate energy and natural resources committee when i testified in november, this is the danger. not saying i have any special insight, but this has been obvious for a long time. okay, so storage. oh, yeah, right, right. so reuter says we need better storage. okay, fine. let's talk about storage. just talking about new friend rita over here. she said can you talk a little bit about battery? sure i can talk about batteries. again, texas about one tenth of everything in the united states. we generate about four petal h