El Paso offers a lesson for the Texas power grid

The only thing worse than experiencing a crisis is not experiencing a crisis.

A gross exaggeration, for sure. Nothing can approximate the sorrow and agony of the people who were there, in the teeth of the catastrophe. They are the ones who faced the pain and, in the aftermath of the pain, the scars, both physical and psychological.

And, yet, it was hard, too, for those who were far away from the brutal snow and rain that afflicted much of Texas. It was a different kind of hard, more emotional than physical, but it was there. A feeling of guilt and helplessness, knowing your friends or relatives were experiencing an emergency that spared you.

If you lived in a community like El Paso, abutting both Mexico

and New Mexico, you knew the feeling. You were hundreds of miles away, and you were grateful for the safety that distance provided, but for some, when guilt collided with gratitude, the former seemed to overpower the latter. Not for all, but for some.

Maybe it was piety. Or maybe it was the safety and security of your surroundings that allowed you the luxury of feeling more guilt than gratitude. Either way, the guilt seemed genuine.

No closer to the catastrophe than their newscasts, El Pasoans remained glued to their television sets, unable to help friends and family more than 500 miles away. They saw what they could not experience — snow pummeling a broad swath of the state. It was, for many, a white blanket of death.

Unlike the regions struck by the winter blast, El Paso experienced milder weather, the 3 inches of snow evaporating within days. Only 3,000 people suffered a power outage, according to reports, and more than 2,000 of those saw their power restored within five minutes. Nobody went days without water or electricity.

Nature was kind to El Paso, but there was another reason for its staunch response to the weather. The “Sun City,” unlike other communities throughout the state, heeded the warnings of 2011, when a winter storm crippled the town. El Paso Electric — which, being so far from the rest of Texas, lies beyond the jurisdiction of ERCOT, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas — spent millions to winterize its power plants.

“In El Paso, everything is working as planned,” Robert Gomez, a resident, told Texas Monthly during the height of the storm. “I’m exasperated to see how the rest of Texas is suffering on such a grand scale.”

Gomez was not alone. It was exasperation mixed with guilt. And there was nothing they could do about it.

Some El Pasoans, knowing their friends or relatives were experiencing power outages in other parts of the state, hesitated to text or email them. The breakdown in communications exacerbated the guilt and the helplessness, leading, in some cases, to anger. An emotion that, sadly, had no outlet, other than trying to express it through fierce but impotent rage.

“My step-daughter in Austin, my military buddy in Dallas, and both my friend and niece in Houston — all are suffering,” an El Pasoan texted a friend during the height of the storm.

While the storm departed, it left its impact behind. Thousands remain under boil-water alerts, while thousands more face the crushing cost of repairing damaged homes. Others confront an even more devastating loss — the death of loved ones, including an 11-year-old boy in Conroe, who was experiencing snow for the first time. What should have been a wondrous moment turned into a tragic reckoning.

Now, nearly two weeks after the initial blast, there is more relief than joy in communities like El Paso, untouched by the tragedy that afflicted much of the state. The ordeal is ending, but the fear that the future holds more tragedy remains. If our officials fail to act, more calamities loom.

In a statewide address on Wednesday, Gov. Gregg Abbott blamed ERCOT. If politicians are adept at anything, it is fingerpointing, and Abbott is no different. ERCOT failed to do its job, yes, but it was up to Abbott to ensure that it did its job. He failed miserably.

The answer may lie in the model established by El Paso. Motivated by the past, the community protected itself against the future. If other communities did the same, it would save a lot of grief, for the hard-hit communities and those from afar who care about them.