Rep. Ann Williams, D-Chicago, chief sponsor of the Clean Energy Jobs Act, or CEJA, which aims to overhaul the state’s energy landscape, said claims that renewable energy sources are not reliable have been discredited. The renewable energy sources in Texas were not equipped for extreme cold, but neither were the thermal sources.
“The issue isn’t with wind turbines, it’s with the state of Texas, and its failure to plan and make investments in the event of an extreme weather emergency,” Williams said.
Williams said energy efficiency should be at the foundation of the conversation as Illinois prepares its grid to face increasingly extreme weather situations as a result of climate change.
But the way energy operates in Texas is also vastly different from Illinois. ERCOT is not federally regulated because its energy does not travel in or out of the state.
In Illinois, the energy grid is part of a multistate transmission entity. Northern Illinois is part of PJM Interconnection, a regional transmission organization, and the rest of the state is part of the Midcontinent Independent System Operator, or MISO.
Those organizations procure energy and capacity, which means the power generators are paid in advance to ensure that the energy capacity will be available when it’s needed at peak usage times for years in advance.
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February 19, 2021 at 07:50PM