- cross-posted to:
- hackernews@derp.foo
- cross-posted to:
- hackernews@derp.foo
Almost three years since the deadly Texas blackout of 2021, a panel of judges from the First Court of Appeals in Houston has ruled that big power companies cannot be held liable for failure to provide electricity during the crisis. The reason is Texas’ deregulated energy market.
The decision seems likely to protect the companies from lawsuits filed against them after the blackout. It leaves the families of those who died unsure where next to seek justice.
In February of 2021, a massive cold front descended on Texas, bringing days of ice and snow. The weather increased energy demand and reduced supply by freezing up power generators and the state’s natural gas supply chain. This led to a blackout that left millions of Texans without energy for nearly a week.
The state has said almost 250 people died because of the winter storm and blackout, but some analysts call that a serious undercount.
For profit isn’t inherently a bad thing, but the more essential the service should warrant more and more regulations on safety security and pricing. They should not be given unlimited control over these.
Government agencies are more than capable of providing equally shitty service even without a profit motive, see: DMV. Any monopoly is. This is partially why regarding universal healthcare most people aren’t advocating for government owned healthcare facilities, but the government being the single payer to privately run facilities to control prices.
While government monopolies can absolutely create shitty services, the main difference between a government service and privately-controlled service is that the government (and hence, the people, in a democracy) has the power to direct the service on how to operate. The government can’t just shut down a private power supplier because their customer service is trash, and the individual consumer has no power as to how the service operates.
I assume the DMV being shitty is just a meme, like Taco Bell giving you diarrhea.
cause i’ve been in many DMVs, in several states, and never had a headache with it, and no one I know personally has had a problem either. Small sample base, of course.