With Winter Storm Coming, Pipeline Company Threatens Gas Supply To Texas Power Plants

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

https://www.wonkette.com/with-winter-storm-coming-pipeline-company-threatens-gas-supply-to-texas-power-plants

A nasty winter storm is expected to hit most of Texas today and tomorrow, and it has Texans understandably concerned. The good news is that it's not forecast to be nearly as bad as last year's massive storm that caused blackouts for millions of Texans and killed 246 people. Still, it's likely to bring temperatures in the low 20s in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, and a "very messy winter mix that could include rain, sleet, or freezing rain, maybe even some snow," according to meteorologist Tim Cady.

Also, there's that little problem we mention in the headline up there, as the Texas Tribune reports: Subsidiaries of a great big pipeline company are threatening to cut off the flow of natural gas to Texas's biggest power generating company because of a financial dispute that goes all the way back to last year's freeze and electric power clusterfuck:

Vistra Corp. subsidiary Luminant on Wednesday asked the Railroad Commission of Texas, which regulates the state’s oil and gas industry, to prevent Energy Transfer LP from cutting off fuel to five Vistra power plants, which produce enough electricity to power 400,000 Texas homes, businesses and critical infrastructure such as hospitals and schools.

The companies under Energy Transfer, the pipeline company, have told Vistra that gas will stop flowing to five Vistra power plants on Monday unless Vistra pays Energy Transfer $21.6 million, according to the filing.

This is also your regular reminder that the "Railroad Commission of Texas" hasn't regulated railroads in decades, but still has the name, possibly as a fun little prank to confuse outsiders.

Also too, as the Houston Chronicle points out, the $21.6 million that Energy Transfer is demanding from Vistra isn't for actual natural gas purchases, but instead is a "penalty imposed by the pipeline firm for buying too much gas and over-supplying their pipelines."

*snip*

[onecaliberal]

1. They're literally killing it.

[MagickMuffin]

2. Well ya know the citizens of Texas are going to have to get used to be dicked around

We don't matter to the big industries. NOPE not one bit.


Gov. Greg Abbott should pay the fine out of his war chest. I'm almost certain he'll make up for his losses.


ETA: Not sure where the meteorologist is getting his data but there isn't any precipitation in DFW's forecast until this coming Monday.

[Budi]

5. Hmmm. Today & nights are cold but ...maybe the following week??

Last night was cold... today's wind is bitter.

[MagickMuffin]

6. Weather Underground mentioned next Monday as having a 57% chance of precipitation

Currently it is 31º but feels like 20º with wind at 16-25.


Staying in and keeping warm, made sure outside kitties have a warm place to stay as well.


Keep warm and safe

[Throck]

3. Hopefully the plants are set up for dual fuel.

Cold weather always causes these types of curtailments in the northeast US. Interruptible vs non-interruptible service. It's a contract thing established in the fuel rates. Boiler plants/electric plants/hospitals/schools most are set up for natural gas and fuel oil of one grade or another.

On a sad not it reflects the poor state of our public and private energy infrastructure. I'm hoping the infrastructure bill addresses this as a priority.

[madville]

9. Dual fuel can buy you a few days at least

At the power plant I worked at we ran natural gas primarily or could run diesel fuel in an emergency. At base load it burns about 7000 gallons of diesel an hour, peak is something like 14,000 gallons an hour. Just say it's an average of 10k gph and we have 1 million gallons on site in a tank, hypothetically we could run around 4 days on that diesel. We had to use water injection when on diesel to reduce NOx (and it also increases power output). We could only store about 400,000 gallons of demineralized water at any given time and our onsite treatment equipment wouldn't be able to keep up on it's own, so yeah we had 4 days of diesel fuel but only say two days of water.

[Throck]

11. Every facility is designed differently

Do you have rail service in?

"Some" I've seen have tank farms but can be re-supplied via railroad tank cars. Trucks too but they take forever.

We also have local rail sidings with coal cars loaded and on standby for the plants that use coal. On rail, ready to pollute us coal.

[madville]

12. Yeah, no two are the same

No rail service at that one, tanker trucks were the only way they could bring diesel in. There was a dock on the river with pumps and a pipeline to the tank yard from when they used to receive bunker C fuel oil by barge but it wasn’t in serviceable condition.

[LetsGoBiden]

4. Beyond messed up

Beyond messed upHow in gods name is the Company going to fine you for buying too much product I’ve never heard of such a thing in my life if I go to Amazon and buy all the supplies they might give me a discount not fine me and try to do it to women and children and people of color in Dallas Fort Worth area is beyond the pale many of our brothers and sisters could die in that 20° is it still lethal yeah I know we all like to beat on Texas but we have people trapped inside there come on now guys an gals this is not cool

[madville]

7. If any deaths result from power outages

caused by them willfully cutting off the gas supply right before a major winter storm, I would hope the State of Texas charges all the executives with murder.

[Liberal In Texas]

8. I don't know where they got their forecast but right now it's sunny and 37

in the DFW area. The next precip in the forecast is Monday at 30% according to NWS.

That said, there is the feeling like we're waiting for the other shoe to drop with cold weather and power outages.

[LeftInTX]

14. They cancelled all the schools in San Antonio today.

People went on a hoarding rampage when they found out.
Some shut their water off.
The low was 34 overnight. It is 35 right now.
It "might" sleet.
Overpasses are probably gonna be slick etc, but that's about all.
Forecast is for a low of 29 and high of 50 tomorrow.

I know high winds/windchill can cause increase power consumption, but I'm not seeing this as some big disaster.

[kimbutgar]

10. I wonder how the right wing will spin it that it's President Biden's fault?

Watching NBC news last night it appears everything that goes wrong is Joe Bidens fault and his presidency is a failure.

That said I don’t get Texas if what happened last year with the outage in the electrical grid why they are not mad at the Governor? And why are they going to re elect such an incompetent leader?

[struggle4progress]

13. ... Railroad Commission officials have not responded to questions about

whether the agency will act ...

During last year’s winter storm — which caused the near-total collapse of the state’s power grid, left millions without power for days and caused hundreds of deaths — Vistra spent approximately $1.5 billion for natural gas, “twice its planned natural gas cost to fuel its entire Texas fleet for a full year,” the filing said. Vistra paid Energy Transfer more than $600 million during the storm, “which is more than 96% of all amounts invoiced by ” ...

While many companies lost money during the storm, Energy Transfer made $2.4 billion. Energy Transfer did not immediately reply to a request for comment ...

Texas homes and businesses could lose power