The B12 (XII) Forum, home of the 'Front Porch, y'all' at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

My feelings are largely an opinion.
As CD mentioned, tax abatement packages of all types are a normal and expected part of enticing new business to an area. I don't have a problem with them. I feel like the Texas leadership loves touting "low taxes" so much that they fail to fund necessary infrastructure projects - leaving bridges, roads, water supplies, and sewers to degrade past the point of safe usage. I believe that Texas often gives deals to attract business that don't pay Texans back fully in compensation or improvement.

don't forget the power grid

I think the amount of attention being paid by the national mediots (and pot stirrers like Fearless) to the Texas power grid is amusing.

A once-in-ten-generations or alternatively once-since-the-beginning-of-recorded-history-in-Texas storm happens and it's below-freezing for an entire week, and there are power grid failures.  And so everyone wants to pile on the Texas power grid that just so happens to run outside of the US power grid and is the only non-Federally-regulated grid in the country.

I mean, surely there's no agenda there, right?  Surely the national mediots couldn't be calling out Texas' energy independence because they'd prefer to see everything Federally controlled?  There's NO WAI they could be pushing their own editorial views here, right?

Meanwhile, the Texas power grid endures brutally hot summers on an every-year basis without any failures, while California goes into rolling brown-outs every time the temperature dial goes over 85 degrees, but not one word about those power failures from the national mediots, even though it happens every single year.

But, sure, there's no agenda...

Ive lived in Texas all my life and dont remember it ever being below freezing for an entire week in Houston

Until I see differently Im assuming we have put in sufficient improvements to avoid a repeat of that crap should we be blessed 2 years in a row

Yup, my entire life in Austin, it's never happened.  I'm willing to bet it won't ever happen again during my lifetime.

Regardless, actual preparedness or lack thereof, is NOT the reason why the national mediots went after the Texas power grid.  If that were a concern, then they'd be talking about California every single year.  But they aren't, and they won't.

All true.

It wasn’t simply below freezing. It was 15-20 degrees below for days. We’re no more built to handle that kind of cold than Ohio is built to withstand hurricanes or heat waves. And don’t give me no bullshit about how hot it gets in Ohio or any of the Northern states. It’s not the same.

Ed Zachery,that's why i don't move to the infernal regions.Can always throw on another layer or two when the the cold winds roar out of Canada and across the Great Lakes.Much nicer IMO than getting slow roasted - but that's just like my opinion,man

A couple of things I wanted to add about the power grid failures. I work in an industrial facility.  It’s not a power plant, but very similar. We have fired equipment, generate steam, use boiler feed water, etc. Our equipment has a design temp that is spec’d when we built the plant. So much degrees for so many hours/days. We have heat tracing and insulation etc according to these specs. This is a billion dollar facility built in 2015, but all the plants are similar. 

I think our plant was specd to run at 18 deg F for 24 hours. The lower the spec, the more expensive it is to build, run, and maintain. When you insulate things you get cui, known as corrosion under insulation. You have to strip the insulation off for maintenance, etc. 

Not only could we not run, we ran out of nat gas. We froze anyways. We recorded temps down to 12 deg F for days. I’m not sure if the power plant located on-site was able to run or not but I think they had to shut down as well. 

Just not designed to run in weather that cold.