Energy land, checked. Solar, wind, battery, and data-center projects, the permits they need, and the grid they plug into. Start here →
Parcel & Grid

Home › Guides › Energy questions

Why did the Texas grid fail in February 2021?

Updated

General information, not a substitute for the advice of an attorney.

Short answer: Generators froze and ran out of fuel faster than demand could be met. The FERC and NERC joint inquiry found that ERCOT ordered 20,000 MW of rolling blackouts, the largest manually controlled load-shedding event in US history, that more than 4.5 million Texans lost power (some for as long as four days), and that freezing issues (44.2%) and fuel issues (31.4%) together caused 75.6% of the unplanned generating unit outages, derates, and failures to start (FERC, final report release).

What failed

  • By fuel type, the failed capacity was 58% natural gas, 27% wind, 6% coal, 2% solar, 7% other, and under 1% nuclear (four units) (FERC).
  • 81% of freeze-related outages happened at temperatures above the units' stated ambient design temperatures, meaning the plants failed in cold they were supposedly built for (FERC).
  • Protecting four types of plant components from icing could have cut outages by 67% in ERCOT, 47% in SPP, and 55% in MISO South (FERC).
  • Natural gas production fell because of freezing weather (43.3%) and because wellheads, gathering systems, and midstream facilities lost their own electric power (21.5%): blackouts cut gas supply to the plants that needed it (FERC).

The final report made 28 formal recommendations, led by revisions to NERC reliability standards on generator winterization, stronger coordination between the natural gas and electric systems, and guidance for identifying gas infrastructure that should be protected from rolling blackouts (FERC). The report covered ERCOT, SPP, and MISO South; it says numerous Texans died but does not give a count (FERC).

What Texas changed afterward

Senate Bill 3 (2021) directed the PUCT to require weatherization of generation and transmission and the Railroad Commission to require it for natural gas infrastructure in the ERCOT region (ERCOT weatherization summary, April 2026). The PUCT's weather emergency preparedness rule (16 TAC 25.55) came in two phases: Phase I, adopted October 19, 2021, set winter standards; Phase II, adopted September 29, 2022, added summer standards, with summer requirements effective June 1, 2023 and winter requirements December 1, 2023 (ERCOT). ERCOT's inspection program began in December 2021, met the original target of 1,800 inspections within three years, and had completed 4,588 inspections as of April 2026; every resource must be inspected at least once every three years. Facilities that fail get a cure period, and unresolved deficiencies go to the PUCT (ERCOT).

The ERCOT summary reports no compliance percentages, penalties, or winter capacity added, so this page makes no claim about how much safer the grid is. For the current outlook, see the question on winter and summer blackout risk.

See what ERCOT is, outage history by county and ZIP, and Texas battery storage fire safety.

General information from the sources linked above, not legal, tax, or financial advice.

Sources and helpful links

More official contacts and resources: Helpful links.

Browse resources