Watch the Texas Power Grid Keep Up with this Weekend’s Artic Blast

If you ask East Texans about the winter of 2021, you'll probably get a mean mug back. That winter brought the most snow and coldest temperatures any of us had seen in a very long time. To make matters worse, most of the state of Texas was without power for up to four days, or longer, because the grid that was supposed to keep everything on couldn't keep up with the massive demand. Since that time, the question has come up many times if that same grid would be able to keep up with any kind of extreme weather like the brutal cold that will settle over East Texas starting tomorrow (December 22).

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Brutal Cold Coming to East Texas

Tomorrow (December 22, 2022), a cold front will make it's way through East Texas bringing a strong north wind and some very cold temperatures. Friday morning (December 23) we could see actual temperatures in the single digits with a wind chill of around minus 12 degrees. That is what we call a brutal cold. We'll stay below freezing until the afternoon of Christmas day when we'll get into the upper 30's or lower 40's. Yeah, its going to be cold.

Texas Power Grid Concerns

Since the winter of 2021, the Texas power grid has been under constant scrutiny anytime there is a moment of extreme weather. During the days of oppressive heat this past summer, many wondered if the grid could keep up to keep our homes cool. It did. Those same scrutinizers are wondering if the grid will be able to keep up with this artic blast.

Monitoring the Texas Power Grid

It is possible to see how the Texas power grid is holding up against the supply that is needed to keep homes warm. ERCOT, or Electric Reliability Council of Texas, has a dashboard available to look at online that gives real time stats of how the grid is performing. One of the most important stats is the energy supply versus the demand. I took this screenshot of the supply and demand for yesterday, December 20, at 3:08 p.m.

The solid purple line is the energy supply while the turquoise line is the demand. So yes, at 3:08 p.m. yesterday, the grid was handling everything very well. Granted it was 46 degrees at that time, too.

The dashboard has a wealth of other stats to go along with the power being generated to Texas. You can see it all at ercot.com/gridmktinfo/dashboards. In the meantime, hunker down and be glad we'll at least have a cold Christmas this year compared to many other years where we could walk around in shorts and flip flops.