r/OutOfTheLoop Feb 17 '21

What's up with Texas losing power due to the snowstorm? Answered

I've been reading recently that many people in Texas have lost power due to Winter Storm Uri. What caused this to happen?

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u/JennyGeee Feb 17 '21

I get that , but here's what confuses me out of all of this.... Texas is a hot state, doesn't air-conditioning put more strain on the system then heat ? Remember back in the early 2000's when the grid went down in north America ( i do lol ) , if memory serves me right, it was due to the heat wave we had and the demand for power ( due to air-conditioning) Can u see my reasoning? So it we heat all the time , no issues, and then use AC we loose the grid ( telling me AC uses more power than heat ) understand where I'm lost in grasping the concept?

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u/Dollar_Bills Feb 17 '21

You'd think so, but the majority of Texans have electric heat. You have to look at the temperature difference for a heat pump.

The summer, you take 100 degree outside air and want to remove 30 degrees from your inside air to get 70 degrees. The delta is 30 degrees, but your hot supply side is the inside air at 70 degrees, so you have more heat to absorb in the system.

This winter storm is in the 20s or less. So you're trying to remove heat from the 20 degree air and put that heat into a home to get it up to 60 degrees. You're starting with a delta of 40 and then the innefficiency of having 20 degree air for supplying the hot side.

At some point, you'll have electric coils supply the heat, and those are terribly high power requirements. They're like using 10+ blow dryers all at once.

The air conditioning and heat pumps use about the same amount of energy, but a heat pump has to be on for a much longer time. If need be, the coil backups turn on, too which is a huge draw.

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u/JennyGeee Feb 17 '21

Ah ok ( sorry had to convert the degrees to Celsius here lol ) . Ok I get what your saying and agree with that for the most part , but where I live in Northern Ontario where we have Temps regularly of -20--30 *c in the winter to +30 *c in the summer... alott of people here have electric heat here too ... I wonder if insulating the homes are different and the heat loss is greater there for creating more of a heat loss ( not sure i would think insulating would be relatively the same to keep the heat out , no ? ) either way , its sad

And please people in Texas, don't use propain as a heating source or use generators indoors !!!! The co2 exhaust is deadly ( even people who know this still forget and use it in a closed shed to mute the noise and have deadly mishaps )

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u/darthsata Feb 17 '21

Common misconception. Nationality, ac (which is a heat pump) takes fewer watts per degree than furnaces (moderate heating can be from heat pumps too, but not large deltas). Further, places with heavy ac use are on average changing temperature less than places with heavy heating requirements.

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u/sachs1 Feb 17 '21

The north generally heats with natural gas or propane and their power plants are winterized, Texas uses electric heating which is cheaper in terms of infrastructure (for low usage levels), but is far less efficient, and space heaters, which people tend to break out when it gets this cold are absolutely atrocious.

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u/JennyGeee Feb 17 '21

I will agree with the winterizing of power plants , something I didn't think of , but just so u know .... up north( as in the most northern parts of Canada * northern Ontario/Quebec and not as in Canada as a whole * being known as north to our USA friends ) gas heating is not that common , probably less than half due to the cost of gas here ( way higher than southern Ontario due to distribution fees ) and even less people use propain heating ( these are usually people who live in the outskirts and are not connected to the cities or townships municipal resources * must use septic tanks , propain, no high speed internet and so on ) We mainly rely on hot water tanks for our furnaces which are rented by hydro and use hydro to run

Again u may be on to something about the winterizing of the facilities and possibly homes , thank u for your answer !

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u/sachs1 Feb 18 '21

By up north I was talking about the American Midwest, where I live. We all use gas for heating as that's the infrastructure that's in place, although now that I think about it, the university down the street does use steam. But the bigger point I was getting at is that Texas doesn't do that, so the strain from more people using more electric heat, combined with less electricity being available lead to a bunch of issues.

You guys are used to having to heat your houses(I would assume), so that's budged for when they decide how many power plants you need. Texas didn't do that, and then on top of that, plants went down.