Texas Senate passes bill requiring solar plants to provide power at night
37 comments
·May 13, 2025jillesvangurp
Hamuko
I was just thinking that this might result in more renewables, as the article states how renewable plants are faster to get online and have been almost all of new production.
Make a law demanding more power → power demand grows rapidly → new power supply is required here and now → companies prioritise whatever power source gets them there faster.
sublinear
I think this is a good idea, and attacks the problem of high availability at the correct abstraction layer.
Demand is lower at night anyway and forces these plants to invest in appropriate energy storage solutions. If we leave this problem up to the rest of the grid we will have even bigger political fights.
docdeek
That was my impression of the description of the bill, too. This part:
>> If passed by the House, state S.B. 715 would require all renewable projects — even existing ones — to buy backup power, largely from coal or gas plants.
If it compelled the renewable projects to buy from a coal plant, that might be an issue. But if the choice is buy from a coal plant OR invest in storage so that the amoutn of energy delivered can be consistent across the day, that’s probably a great outcome.
firesteelrain
A lot of people miss the fact that coal or natural gas can provide on demand power much faster to customers when solar plants go dormant at night.
standardUser
Much faster than what? Than battery storage?
watwut
Demand being lower at night implies it makes sense to demand solar production at night?
Arnt
That's not what Texas demands. Rather, it demands being able to produce above average at night, which is far above what the usage patterns require.
firesteelrain
No, it is is because Texas is adding redundancy requirements. Full investment in solar is dangerous - just look at Spain and Portugal recently. Texas has a duty to provide reliable power to its customers.
piva00
I will basically copy-paste my other reply[0] to you because you are spreading a narrative that is potentially wrong (and at the very least quite misleading):
There has been no conclusive post mortem, the issue is still under investigation[1], this is a blog post by a tech company, not an authoritative agency with findings, basically speculation being used as a marketing article...
This article[2] also calls out the rumor mill about renewables being a cause:
> Political groups such as the far-right VOX – which has historically pushed back against climate action such as the expansion of renewables – also pointed to the blackout as evidence of “the importance of a balanced energy mix”.
> However, others rejected this suggestion, with EU energy chief Dan Jørgensen telling Bloomberg that the blackout could not be pinned on a “specific source of energy”:
> “As far as we know, there was nothing unusual about the sources of energy supplying electricity to the system yesterday. So the causes of the blackout cannot be reduced to a specific source of energy, for instance renewables.”
> Others have sought to highlight that, while it was possible solar power was involved in the initial frequency event, this does not mean that it was ultimately the cause of the blackout.
It's all inconclusive and the narrative that solar is the culprit is being pushed by anti-renewables, let's wait until there's an official conclusion to the investigation instead of peddling bullshit.
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43970583
[1] https://www.entsoe.eu/news/2025/05/01/iberian-black-out-ents...
[2] https://www.carbonbrief.org/qa-what-we-do-and-do-not-know-ab...
misja111
I'm reading the original bill, I can't find anywhere where it says that solar plants have to buy backup power from gas or coal plants. It says they have to be able to operate for 24h above seasonal average, "when called upon". Using batteries for this is explicitly allowed.
I guess the reason for this bill is stability of the grid. I'm not saying if this makes this bill good or bad, I'm not enough of an expert into electrical grids.
The original bill: https://capitol.texas.gov/tlodocs/89R/billtext/pdf/SB00715S....
Arnt
24h is a lot of battery power, and above average level, too, which means that the average level has to be throttled below what the sun and panels allow.
Sounds quite dirigiste to me. Cf Germany, which allows separate operators to connect batteries to the grid (and there's a stampede). The battery operators plan to buy cheap wind power at night or cheap sun at midday, and they are not constrained to use one source of power the way Texas requires.
energy123
Texas lawmakers realized their free market approach led to renewables dominating, and had to put their government thumb on the scales.
null
eastabrooka
I don't see a problem in this, Renewables do put strain on the grid and atleast legislating for this means they have to put some stationary storage batteries in, and that helps smooth peak demand etc.
energy123
The problem is it's a disingenuous and malicious non-solution by ideologues, not a real solution to a real problem. The solution already exists and is already in place in ERCOT. The pricing mechanism.
eastabrooka
> it's a disingenuous and malicious non-solution by ideologues,
Are you new to Politics or something?
fifticon
no worries, they will also pass a law requiring the sun to shine at night, so it all works out.
ars
This title is click bait, and the article is poorly written.
A better title: "Texas Senate passes bill requiring renewables to designate backup power to reduce their volatility"
I also clicked on the references given in the article, and they don't exactly say what the article claims.
For example: "A study by the Texas Association of Business (TAB) found that the legislation would cost the state $5.2 billion more per year — and cost individual consumers $225 more."
That's not what the link says, the link says that reducing the growth of renewables would do that. The article pretends that this legislation would reduce renewables, but it does not actually prove that claim.
The Hill usually has higher quality work, this article is garbage.
sph
Thank you, and post flagged for political clickragebait which we get too much of already in here.
Terr_
Digging up the vote [0] it seems to be party-line: 20 Republicans in favor, 11 Democrats against.
rzz3
I don’t understand why we’re not going to nuclear.
atwrk
Because it is outrageously expensive compared to renewables, you can't turn it off at night, it takes literally decades to build, and nobody wants it near where they live.
davkan
Nobody wants a plant in their backyard, nobody wants to store the waste in their state, the investment takes the length of career to pay off.
AndrewDucker
Too expensive
lemper
can't help but to think that somebody has bribed them to pass the stupid bill, yea? oh, sorry, "lobbied" is the correct word for it. anyway, what's with texas and fossil fuel love-story? seems they don't want to get separated.
kubb
> The Texas Public Policy Foundation, a right-wing think tank that is one of the bill’s most prominent advocates
Why is it always right wingers that are introducing these unreasonable ideas?
null
Texas should be careful what they ask for; they might get it. Their intention is obviously to protect their gas exploitation industry and sell lots of gas. But the net result might actually be making gas power plants more redundant faster.
Batteries would allow solar plants to provide power when the sun doesn't shine. And those are of course already being deployed in record numbers on the grid and very popular in combination with wind and solar setups. Any surplus of battery capacity would weaken the business case for operating gas plants and push those into the role of peaker plants.
Australia is a good benchmark of what that looks like. Several of their states run on solar and battery most of the time with coal/gas plants only switching on occasionally now.