Abbott Gives Regulators He Appointed Pass
in Blame Game after Targeting Clean Energy

Mike Hailey
Capitol Inside
February 24, 2021

Governor Greg Abbott vowed on Wednesday night that the 2021 regular session wouldn't end until state lawmakers overhaul the Electric Reliability Council of Texas complete with the funding for the winterization and stabilization of the power grid that failed last week during a record winter storm.

While Abbott doesn't actually have the authority to extend the session that will end on May 31 if not sooner, he has the power to call legislators back to Austin for special sessions if he deems their work on ERCOT in the next three months to be inadequate.

Abbott assured Texans in a public service message that was televised live that he's already cleaning house at ERCOT with resignations by several top staff members in the past two days. The Republican governor declined to point the finger of blame at the state regulatory agency that's supposed to oversee the state's independent power system.

The Republican-controlled Legislature gave Public Utility Commission the responsibility of ERCOT oversight in the agency's sunset bill that was approved in 2011. GOP leaders at the Capitol rejected attempts by Democrats at the time to make ERCOT subject to Sunset Advisory Commission reviews that are required to keep state agencies in existence every 12 years. But that didn't free the PUC from its official task of monitoring the private energy interests that have been allowed to run the Texas grid like a business.

The PUC is led by three commissioners - DeAnn Walker, Arthur D'Andrea and Shelly Botkin - who were all appointed by Abbott in the past three years to the governing board for the agency that regulates electric utilities and has veto power over rates increases. Abbott tapped Walker to chair the PUC in September 1917.

Walker and D'Andrea worked on Abbott staffs in the governor's office and attorney general's office respectively before landing appointments from him to the PUC. Walker - a former high-ranking official at CenterPoint Energy - served as a senior Abbott advisor on regulated industries before her selection as the PUC chair. Walker is an ex-officio member on the ERCOT board in her role as the PUC chair.

Botkin served as ERCOT's corporate communications and government relations director before a promotion to PUC commissioner in June 2018 for a six-year term.

While Abbott apparently doesn't fault the PUC for failing to keep ERCOT in line, he said twice during his brief remarks tonight that all of the energy sources that power the Texas grid failed during the epic winter freeze. Abbott raised the specter of a possible cover up for the oil and gas industry when he initially sought to blame green energy in a move that backfired amid revelations that natural gas and coal were the primary culprits in light of the fact that they'd supply the lion's share of power to ERCOT.

The governor didn't mention in the live broadcast from the Texas Department of Emergency Management that wind and solar power account for less than a fourth of the electricity that's distributed by ERCOT to 90 percent of the people who live in Texas.