by Steve Milloy, E&E Legal Senior Policy Fellow and Junkscience.com Founder
As Appearing on The Daily Caller
A potentially deadly winter storm is bearing down on most of the U.S., followed by days of bitter, if not record cold. This sort of extreme weather is a good example of why President Donald Trump’s effort to make coal great again matters.
More deaths occur during cold temperatures than during hot temperatures. Warmth is essential for survival in extreme cold. Electricity is generally needed to do that, even if your home is heated by oil or gas. Utilities, therefore, must keep the electricity flowing.
Five years ago on Valentine’s Day, wind turbines in Texas literally froze during a severe winter storm. Despite the foreseeability of the weather and the wind turbine failure, back-up gas plants had not been prepared to make up for the loss in electricity generation. Hundreds of Texans died as a result of the grid failure. The grid itself came within moments of being severely damaged, which would have been absolutely catastrophic.
But even if the gas plants had been prepared to back-up the wind turbines, there might still have been problems as explained in this week’s New York Times report, “Storm Poses Big Threats to Power Grids Across U.S.”
