this post was submitted on 12 May 2025
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"The Texas Senate passed a bill Thursday that leading business interests fear would lead to an age of expensive power and rolling blackouts.

If passed by the House, state S.B. 715 would require all renewable projects — even existing ones — to buy backup power, largely from coal or gas plants.

This would require solar plants in particular to buy backup power to “match their output at night — a time when no one expects them to produce energy and when demand is typically at its lowest anyway,” consultant and energy expert Doug Lewin wrote in an April analysis"

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[–] Dogyote@slrpnk.net 16 points 2 days ago (1 children)

You don't understand Texas's powergrid. It's a free market, there is little planning or foresight. Large scale power production is provided by hundreds, possibly thousands, of independent producers who can turn their production on as they see fit, in other words, when it's profitable. Therefore backup generation for solar is already present. If there's not enough, then the market will dictate how much to build and where. That's how it works in Texas.

instead of dumping the volatility on ancillary services, which get less revenue, because of their off-time, accommodating wind and solar.

Free market, they can deal with it. Yes, it's a dumb system, but thems the rules in Texas.

A mandate like this makes room for reliable energy rollout, basically more support for natural gas, and presumably batteries, instead of just crowding out the preferred energy types.

This bill is clearly designed to stifle renewable production in favor of fossil energy. Requiring one mode of production to have or purchase backup generation isn't fair in the current market system. Do away with the market system first before putting a thumb on the scale.

Also preferred energy types? Energy types with the least amount of emissions should be preferred. Not gas, not coal, not oil, or whatever else Texas wants to burn.

[–] Leeks@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Per the text of the bill solar producers could just claim maintenance every night.

[–] Dogyote@slrpnk.net 1 points 22 hours ago

Ha, hey ERCOT, we gotta clean these panels every night, takes 15 hours.