After Blackouts, Texas Moves to Make Power Plants Weatherize (1)

摘要

Texas lawmakers advanced a sweeping and potentially costly measure that would require power plants and some gas facilities to prepare for extreme winter weather as part of an effortto avoid a repeat of February’s energy crisis.The Texas House of Representatives on Monday gave final approval to a bill requiring power generators and critical gas infrastructure to make upgrades enabling them to function duringfreezing temperatures. It’s unclear how much the upgrades would cost power and gas companies, but violators would face a minimum penalty of $5,000 a day. In extreme cases, finescould reach $1 million.The bill, which received initial approval after being amended in the House on Sunday, will head back to the state Senate for passage before it can go to the governor’s desk for signature.The measure is the most ambitious attempt yet by the legislature to address the causes of blackouts that left more than 4 million Texans in the dark for days and resulted in at least 100deaths. The state grid operator had to institute the catastrophic power cuts when nearly half of the state’s generation capacity failed during an Arctic blast that froze wind turbines, coalpiles, power plant instruments and gas wellheads.