Texas: Energy, the Grid, and the Price of Denial

By Cliff Potts, CSO
Editor-in-Chief, WPS News

Baybay City, Leyte, Philippines — May 1, 2026, 9:15 p.m. PHT

Texas likes to think of itself as an energy state. Oil, gas, wind, solar — we have all of it. And yet, when the lights go out, when the heat becomes deadly, or when a winter storm knocks the grid flat on its back, we suddenly act surprised. As if this all came out of nowhere. It didn’t. These failures were forecast years in advance. We just chose not to listen.

Energy is not ideology. It is engineering. It is planning. It is maintenance. And in Texas, we have spent far too long confusing political posture with physical reality.

The Grid Didn’t Fail by Accident

Texas’s electric grid failures were not acts of God. They were acts of policy. Decisions were made to isolate the grid, minimize regulation, and prioritize short-term profit over long-term resilience. Those decisions had consequences. People froze in their homes. People died. Businesses collapsed. Entire communities were thrown into chaos.

What made those events worse was not just the outage itself, but the refusal to take responsibility afterward. Blame was scattered everywhere except where it belonged: on governance that treated critical infrastructure as a political talking point instead of a public obligation.

A grid is not strong because it is cheap. It is strong because it works when conditions are bad.

Energy Abundance Is Not the Same as Energy Security

Texas produces enormous amounts of energy. That fact has lulled policymakers into complacency. Production does not equal reliability. Abundance does not equal resilience. A state can produce all the energy in the world and still fail its people if distribution, storage, and backup systems are weak.

Wind turbines freezing was not the problem. Natural gas infrastructure failing was not the problem. Solar underperforming during storms was not the problem. The problem was that Texas built an energy system without redundancy and then pretended that redundancy was unnecessary.

Every serious energy system plans for failure. Texas planned for profit.

Climate Reality Doesn’t Care What We Believe

Texas politics often treats climate change as a debate. Texas weather treats it as a fact. Hotter summers, more intense storms, longer droughts, and greater strain on water and power systems are already here. Insurance markets are reacting. Agriculture is reacting. Public health systems are reacting.

The only thing lagging behind is policy.

Refusing to acknowledge climate reality does not protect the economy. It destabilizes it. Energy demand spikes during extreme heat. Infrastructure ages faster. Maintenance costs rise. Emergency responses become routine. This is not hypothetical. It is already happening.

The Cost of Cheap Power

Texans are often told that deregulation keeps energy prices low. What rarely gets mentioned is the hidden cost of that cheap power. Grid failures destroy food, medicine, and equipment. Businesses lose revenue. Families incur repair costs. Emergency services are stretched thin. Lives are lost.

When those costs are added up, “cheap” power turns out to be very expensive.

A serious state calculates total cost, not just monthly bills.

Renewable Energy Is Not the Enemy

Texas has become a national leader in wind energy, and solar capacity continues to grow. This is not a threat to Texas identity. It is an extension of it. Texans have always used what the land gives them. Wind and sun are no different from oil and gas in that respect.

The mistake is framing energy transition as replacement instead of integration. A resilient Texas energy system uses multiple sources, backed by storage, upgraded transmission, and modern grid management. It does not pit one sector against another for political points.

Energy workers deserve stability, retraining opportunities, and respect. Transition does not mean abandonment. It means planning.

Infrastructure Is a Public Responsibility

Energy infrastructure is not a luxury. It is as fundamental as roads, bridges, and water systems. Treating it as a private gamble rather than a public responsibility invites failure. Other states, and other countries, understand this. Texas should too.

That means enforcing standards. It means requiring weatherization. It means investing in grid upgrades and transmission capacity. It means planning for peak demand instead of reacting to collapse.

None of this is radical. It is basic competence.

Energy, Water, and the Future

Energy policy does not exist in isolation. It intersects directly with water use, agriculture, and urban growth. Power plants require water. Water systems require power. Drought strains both. Planning them separately guarantees inefficiency and conflict.

A forward-looking Texas coordinates energy and water policy, anticipates growth, and prepares for stress instead of denying it.

What Leadership Looks Like Here

Leadership on energy does not mean promising impossible outcomes. It means telling people the truth. It means acknowledging tradeoffs. It means investing now to avoid catastrophe later.

Texans can handle hard truths. What they cannot handle is being treated like fools.

The Price of Denial

Every year Texas delays serious energy reform, the bill grows larger. The cost shows up in emergency spending, insurance premiums, lost productivity, and human suffering. Denial does not make problems cheaper. It makes them compound.

Texas has the resources, talent, and experience to build an energy system that works under pressure. What it lacks is the will to stop pretending that the current approach is good enough.

Why This Matters Going Forward

Energy underpins everything else this series will discuss: work, health, education, public safety, and economic stability. Without reliable power, none of those systems function. Energy policy is not a niche issue. It is foundational governance.

Texas can lead on energy, not just in production, but in reliability and responsibility. Or it can continue to gamble and hope the next crisis is survivable.

Hope is not a plan.

This essay will be archived as part of the ongoing WPS News Monthly Brief Series available through Amazon.

References (APA)
U.S. Energy Information Administration. (2025). Texas energy production, capacity, and reliability data.
Public Utility Commission of Texas. (2025). Electric grid performance and weatherization reports.
National Renewable Energy Laboratory. (2025). Grid resilience and renewable integration studies.
Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts. (2025). Economic impacts of energy disruptions.
NOAA. (2025). Climate trends and extreme weather impacts in Texas.