BOSTON, March 19, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — Analysis Group, one of the largest international economics consulting firms, announced that Senior Advisor Susan F. Tierney, Ph.D., provided testimony at yesterday’s US House of Representatives Committee on Science, Space, and Technology hearing on the aftermath of the February, 2021 blackouts Texas experienced due to severe winter weather. The hearing was held to discuss what caused the extended power outages, and identify critical research and development needs for grid resilience, reliability, and security.
Dr. Tierney led her testimony with key factors that affected the electricity outages, based on her regulatory and consulting experience in the energy industry and on media reports of the events in Texas. Primary among her findings was that a regional cold snap in 2011 held enough lessons for the state to have avoided much of the 2021 crisis. In a postmortem report of the earlier incident, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and the North American Electric Regulatory Commission (NERC) had outlined five steps to better prepare the regional grid for severe weather.
For the most part, the electric and gas industries in Texas did not act on those recommendations, nor did regulators at the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) (for electric industry issues) or the Texas Railroad Commission (for gas industry issues). As of the start of 2021, the power generation and gas production/delivery systems in Texas had not undergone the types of weatherization that could have enabled energy supply in the event of extreme winter temperatures.
In the second part of her testimony, Dr. Tierney referenced the work of two National Academies of Sciences committees she participated in – the 2017 report Enhancing the Resilience of the Electric Grid, and the 2021 report The Future of Electric Power in the United States – that highlighted research needs to enhance reliability and resilience of the electric system. She focused on five key areas for improvement, referencing actionable recommendations for each as detailed in the National Academies’ work:
- Improve understanding of how the electric system is evolving
- Ensure that electricity service remains clean and sustainable, and reliable and resilient
- Improve understanding of how people use electricity and sustain the “social compact” to keep electricity affordable and equitable in the face of profound technological changes
- Facilitate innovations in technology, policy, and business models relevant to the power system
- Accelerate innovations in technology in the face of shifting global supply chains and the influx of disruptive technologies
Dr. Tierney went on to underscore the National Academies’ views regarding the essential role of federal support for electric system issues:
The Department of Energy is the federal entity with a mission to focus on the longer-term issues of developing and promulgating technologies and strategies to increase the resilience and modernization of the electric grid. No other entity in the United States has the mission to support such work, which is critical as the electricity system goes through the transformational changes described in this report. The committee views research, development, and demonstration activities that support reliable and resilient electricity systems to constitute a public good. If funding is not provided by the federal government, the committee is concerned that this gap would not be filled either by states or by the private sector. In part this is because the challenges and solutions to ensuring grid resilience are complex, span state and even national boundaries, and occur on time scales that do not align with business models.
A recording of the hearing and written witness testimony are available on the committee’s website.
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About Analysis Group:
Analysis Group is one of the largest international economics consulting firms, with more than 1,000 professionals across 14 offices in North America, Europe, and Asia. Since 1981, we have provided expertise in economics, finance, health care analytics, and strategy to top law firms, Fortune Global 500 companies, and government agencies worldwide. Our internal experts, together with our network of affiliated experts from academia, industry, and government, offer our clients exceptional breadth and depth of expertise.
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