In the West Texas Oil Patch, Power Emergencies Are Stacking Up

Power shortages in West Texas are testing the limits of the state’s power grid after a brutal summer of record high demand and prices.

During the day, solar farms can offer enough power in the oil-rich region to supplement supplies imported from other parts of the state. But as the sun set over the past two nights, the grid struggled to keep enough electricity flowing into the Permian Basin, according to Flannan Hehir, an analyst at Genscape.

Power prices that were trading at less than $30 surged to more than $3,000 a megawatt-hour, and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, ...