Ercot nearly at capacity for Texas power grid

Re:Ercot nearly at capacity for Texas power grid by jodrellblank on Monday February 15, 2021 @04:09AM (#26140727)

What’s the problem with incandescents here? They’re inefficient, which means they turn lots of energy into heat instead of light, which means your thermostat will turn down your heating to compensate because it needs to produce less of the desired amount of heat.

In the abstract, they’re bad when you’re cooling a Texas house and they’re putting more heat into it; on a cold night a 100W resistance heater is a 100W resistance heater and if you’d banned them, the people with them would need 100W heat from another source for every bulb replaced. That wouldn’t save power or money or reduce demand now as you seem to be suggesting.

Or it’s day time and the bulbs are off, or nighttime and the bulbs are off for sleep. They seem the least relevant thing to gripe about in this specific context?

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Re:Ercot nearly at capacity for Texas power grid by bluGill on Monday February 15, 2021 @06:37AM (#26141760)

Natural gas to a powerplant is overall less energy efficient compared to natural gas to a high efficiency home furnace.

This is about Texas though where high efficiency gas furnaces. In the north natural gas is the normal way to heat. I'm not sure about Texas.

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Re:Ercot nearly at capacity for Texas power grid by briandear on Monday February 15, 2021 @08:58AM (#26142788)

Natural gas heating is common in Houston. Most new construction I’ve looked at in north Houston use gas forced air for heating. I have never seen electric central heating in Houston; I am sure it exists, but in my experience most houses that have central heat, have gas.

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Re:Ercot nearly at capacity for Texas power grid by clavalle on Monday February 15, 2021 @10:43AM (#26143733)

I'm in Austin and my heater uses gas. Every house I've had has used gas. It's incredibly cheap around here.

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