Protesters demand changes for ERCOT in wake of failure
About 50 people gathered Sunday afternoon outside ERCOT'S campus in suburban Austin, demanding the nonprofit that controls about 85 percent of the Texas power grid take responsibility for the disastrous failure that plunged millions into darkness without heat or water.
Hosted by the Party for Socialism and Liberation, Austin Stops Evictions and other groups, the protest called for the independent organization to be put under public control and be required to pay for the public crisis it created.
“This is the first, and hopefully there will be more to come,” said Rachel Tucker, a 36-year-old organizer from San Antonio. “The people know now that ERCOT and the government don't have the public's interest in mind.”
Organizers said the Electric Reliability Council of Texas and 220 electricity companies should cancel electricity debts that accumulated during the winter storm and “reimburse people whose bank accounts were robbed by the companies.”
They also want the state to provide funding for all whose homes were damaged by the energy collapse; stop ERCOT from passing on the cost of upgrading its infrastructure to the public; pay reparations to the families who lost loved ones; begin an “immediate and rapid conversion” to renewable solar and wind energy; and to commit to opening more shelters during extreme weather events.
“We're here to demand better and to make sure this doesn't happen again,” said Briana Griffith, one of the event's organizers.
State legislators, county and district attorneys, and a cadre of local mayors all are looking into what went wrong on Feb. 15, when near collapse of the grid led to dozens of deaths and billions of dollars in property damage.
In San Antonio, Mayor Ron Nirenbeg has appointed a panel to investigate whether city government could have done more to prepare San Antonio residents for last week's devastating winter storm, which cut off power, heat and water to a significant chunk of the city.
Nirenberg charged the seven-person group with figuring out “how our emergency response operations and public utilities got in this situation and what can be done to be better prepared for the future.”