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Rural Texas is generally not a place where we look for advice, but perhaps it should be. A recent commentary in The Amarillo Globe-News caught our eye because the problems it describes sound so similar to the ones we find in rural Virginia. The writer bemoans the population exodus from rural counties as the economy finds more and more reasons to create jobs in metro areas and fewer reasons to create them in rural communities. “That rural exodus has come at a cost,” the writer says. “As people have moved away to the urban areas, the lifeblood of many smaller Texas communities ha...

Averting crisis: Path to weatherize Texas power plants and some gas wells set under compromise bill The Legislature’s biggest answer yet to weaknesses exposed by winter storm selectively weatherizes gas infrastructure, creates outage alerts and tightens coordination. A compromise bill unveiled by Texas House leaders on Tuesday would respond to February's electricity crisis by, among other things, weatherizing power plants – and, selectively, natural gas infrastructure. The bill also would create outage alerts and require grid managers and utility regulators to practice for emergencies.(Sm...

Fotolia In efforts to prevent a repeat of the February disaster that left millions without electricity, Texas policymakers continue to disagree over the cause and appropriate mitigation efforts. The blackouts from the storm led to spikes in power prices and the deaths of at least 151 people. Republican leadership was quick to criticize renewables for the role they played in the blackouts, with Gov. Greg Abbott, R, claiming on national television that renewables caused the outages. They "cannot be dispatched" by the Electric Reliability Council ...

Lawmakers try new solution to minimize winter storm debt Most agree that securitization is an effective proposal to fairly and quickly pay off storm debt. Not all agree how to do it, and what costs should be covered. Large electrical transmission lines cross through South Arlington, Texas, on Feb. 17, 2021. Rolling power outages disrupted service to customers following snow storms. (Tom Fox/The Dallas Morning News)(Tom Fox / Staff Photographer) AUSTIN — One lingering question from February’s devastating winter storm is what, if anything, to do about the remaining debt of some electrici...

When deadly winter storms ravaged the state in February and power outages plunged more than 4 million people into cold and darkness, Gov. Greg Abbott had already set his priorities for the Legislature and the 140-day legislative session was a month old. Lawmakers were tackling issues related to the coronavirus pandemic, navigating a budget shortfall and pursuing conservative priorities such as expanding abortion restrictions, limiting transgender athletes and eliminating gun permits. But after the lights came back on, legislators had a new mission: Make drastic changes to the state’s pow...