.jpg)
The electricity grid covering most of Texas held up as of Monday during the latest winter storm, although localized power outages were reported in deep East Texas and far West Texas.
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas dashboard indicated demand was running comfortably below available capacity. As of Sunday, more than 128,000 customers were without power, according to poweroutage.us, with the most being reported in Nacogdoches, Cherokee and Rusk counties.
“Based on expected weather conditions, ERCOT anticipates there will be sufficient generation to meet demand,” an ERCOT spokesperson said. “ERCOT will continue to deploy all available resources to manage the grid reliably and coordinate closely with the Public Utility Commission, generation providers and transmission utilities.”
Gov. Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration just prior to the storm for 134 Texas counties to ensure adequate resources remained available to Texans.
Crockett, Talarico hold first debate
U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett and state Rep. James Talarico both presented themselves as fighters during their first debate in the Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate, held in Georgetown last Saturday.
The two are competing to face the GOP primary winner. Incumbent U.S. Sen. John Cornyn faces challengers Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and U.S. Rep. Wesley Hunt.
The two Democrats debated for an hour, The Texas Tribune reported. Crockett pitched herself as a political brawler who could expand the electorate, while Talarico emphasized his Christian faith and record fighting “tooth and nail” in the Texas House.
The primary is March 3.
Data centers could strain water supply A new report says the boom in data centers across Texas could consume nearly 3% of the state’s water by 2030, the Houston Chronicle reported. The Houston Advanced Research Center found the data centers, which power artificial intelligence, used 25 billion gallons of water in 2025.
That amount could increase to 161 billion gallons annually by 2030.
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas has already warned the data centers, which also require vast amounts of electricity, could potentially strain the state’s power grid.
ERCOT oversees most of the state’s power grid.
“The data-center surge presents a unique challenge that requires immediate attention,” said HARC President John Hall. An estimated 575 data centers are already in place, concentrated in Dallas-Fort Worth, Austin, Houston and San Antonio.
Texas legislators last year passed a law setting up a $20 billion water fund, with $1 billion disbursed annually starting in 2027 for infrastructure, after an initial allocation of $2.5 billion.
Abbott endorses Miller’s GOP challenger
Gov. Greg Abbott has endorsed the Republican primary challenger to Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller, the Austin American-Statesman reported. Abbott said he is backing challenger Nate Sheets because he is “committed to fighting for the best interests of Texas agriculture, upholding the rule of law and restoring integrity.”
Miller is seeking his fourth term to the office he has held since 2015. He has strong ties to President Donald Trump and was the first statewide elected official to endorse his candidacy in 2016. Sheets is a beekeeper and owns a honey company.
To date, Trump has made no endorsement in this year’s primary.
Quorum- busting House Dems fined
The Texas House Democrats who left the state last summer to delay a bid to redraw congressional maps each now face more than $9,000 in fines, the Austin American-Statesman reported. That includes $7,000 in penalties for being absent and another $2,354 to cover the costs the state spent trying to bring them back to the Capitol.
The members have until Feb. 9 to appeal. House Democratic Caucus leader Gene Wu, D-Houston, said members plan to protest to the House Administration Committee.
“Breaking quorum is a constitutional right, and we will use every tool available to challenge these fines,” Wu said. More than 50 of the 62 House Democrats flew to Chicago to stop the attempt by GOP members to redraw the maps to give Republicans a likely additional five seats. The walkout lasted two weeks.
Upon their return, the redistricting plan passed in the GOP-controlled Legislature and was signed into law. It triggered similar mid-decade redistricting attempts by both parties in other states.
Orphaned oil and gas wells reach record high The number of orphaned wells in Texas climbed above 11,000 by the end of last year, breaking a 20-year record, according to the Houston Chronicle.
The Texas Railroad Commission, which regulates the state’s oil and gas industry, reported about 2,000 new wells joined the list last year, bringing the total to 11,123.
Orphaned wells are not actively maintained and have no operator on file at the commission. That means responsibility for cleaning and plugging them is on the state.
The price of oil fell roughly 20% last year, meaning more companies have gone bankrupt or out of business. The defunct operations sometimes leave unplugged wells behind.
“While there has been a recent increase in these populations due to various external factors such as operator bankruptcies and aging wells, we are in the process of taking significant actions to increase our well-plugging efforts,” said Bryce Dubee, a spokesman for the Railroad Commission.
Appeals court rehears immigration law challenge A 2023 law giving state police authority to arrest people suspected of crossing the border into Texas illegally is once again before the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which blocked the law from taking effect in the initial legal challenge.
The court heard oral arguments last week, The Texas Tribune reported.
The Biden administration sued to block the law after its passage, arguing that policing immigration rests with the federal government alone. A three-judge panel upheld an injunction blocking the law. Since then, the state has appealed, asking for the case to be reheard by the entire 17-judge appeals court.
At the time the law passed in December 2023, the U.S. Border Patrol reported nearly 250,000 encounters with migrants along the border with Mexico. That number has plummeted in the past year, with just 4,264 migrant apprehensions reported in December.
Borders is a veteran awardwinning Texas journalist. He published community newspapers in Texas during a 30-year span, including in Longview, Fort Stockton, Nacogdoches, Lufkin and Cedar Park. Email: gborders@ texaspress.com.
