The Day the Electricity Died

Editor’s Note: This column was written by Frank Lasee. 

Imagine one of your kids freezing to death in your home. Eleven-year-old Cristian Pineda’s mother found her son dead during the Texas blackout in February 2021. Or you have a power outage for three days, losing a couple of hundred dollars worth of food because your refrigerator didn’t work, as Michelle Jones did last summer. The food she had just bought to feed herself, her daughter, and her granddaughter spoiled without electricity.

This is likely to become all too common in the future.

Why?

My years as a Wisconsin state senator and in Gov. Scott Walker’s administration gave me some insights. My senate district included a coal plant, a natural gas plant, two nuclear plants, a biogas plant, biodigesters, wind towers, and many miles of Lake Michigan shoreline—and since then it has added a solar plant. Here are some lessons I’ve learned.

First, we need to understand a little bit about how electric grids work. They cannot store electricity without a battery. Batteries are scarce and expensive. Electric demand must be met with electricity generation, always. If supply cannot keep up with demand, the utility will shut down electricity for some or many.

For nearly a week, Texas utilities were unable to meet demand. They shut down the electric grid. Five million people lost power, and from 250 to 700 died. If an electric grid breaks, all the people it serves will be without electricity for weeks or months.

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