The governing body that administers the state’s power grid has asked Texans to save energy on Tuesday afternoon and evening as demand has grown close to available supply.
Texas Electricity Reliability Council posted to Twitter at 4:42 p.m. Tuesday, urging consumers and businesses to cut their energy consumption by evening.
ERCOT issued a follow-up statement just before 9pm on Tuesday, saying that the call for conservation had ended and that there was never a need to enter a situation of “energy emergency”.
High temperatures across North Texas on Tuesday afternoon were in the upper 70s and lower 80s.
“Due to a combination of typical high-generation outages in April and higher-than-forecast demand from a cold front stranded across Texas, ERCOT could enter an emergency this afternoon,” said Woody Rickerson, ERCOT’s vice president. for network planning and operations. statement. “Given the event in February, it is important to remember that we do not expect customer outages. Rather, this declaration of urgency allows us to access tools to bring supply and demand back online. ”
ERCOT suggested the next steps to help conserve energy.
- Turn off unnecessary lights and equipment.
- Raise the thermostat by 2 to 3 degrees.
- Set programmable thermostats to higher temperatures when no one is home.
- Use the fans to feel cooler than 4 to 6 degrees.
- Limit the use of large appliances (for example, dishwasher, washing machine, dryer, etc.).
- If you are cooking indoors, use a microwave or slow cooker.
- Close the blinds and curtains in the late afternoon.
- Schedule pool pumps to run early in the morning or overnight.
This is a developing story, check again for updates.