Latest Tally: 35 COVID-19 Deaths and 383 New Cases. Dallas County now has nearly 250,000 residents who have received at least one dose of a coronavirus vaccine and more than 100,000 who have been fully vaccinated. But County Judge Clay Jenkins said last night that the Fair Park vaccination site could be closed through Saturday. The delivery of vaccines has been put on hold due to current weather conditions.
Dealing With Burst Pipes? So Is Fair Park. The Cotton Bowl, Tower Building, and newly renovated Hall of State have all sustained water damage. But Big Tex couldn’t fit in the crawl space to figure out where all the water is coming from.
Speaking of Pipes, Don’t Shower Today. You know you probably weren’t going to anyway, but now you have a reason. Although Dallas’ water supply is safe at the moment, damaged pipes may be the reason for a jump in usage, so conservation on behalf of sanitation systems, firefighters, and hospitals is the better part of valor. A number of North Texas cities have already had to institute boil notices, including University Park. For a complete list, check here.
In “Good News,” Rolling Outages Have Begun! ERCOT says the “best case scenario” of rotating outages of an hour or less should be implemented today. So if you’ve had power, you may start to lose it. If you’ve had no power, keep your fingers crossed that today’s the day it (mostly) comes back online.
Stop Blaming the Turbines. Yes, some of those suckers went offline. But you know where we still get most of our power? From fossil fuels, my friend. Ask your first grader. She’ll tell you that 80 percent of the grid’s winter capacity, or 67 gigawatts, is usually generated by natural gas, coal, and a bit of nuclear power. Twenty-eight gigawatts of that is currently offline, with a big portion of that due to frozen natural gas pipes. Send your daughter outside to try this solar-powered science experiment today while you sit inside, eating the cold leftover pizza from the box, briefly warmed by schadenfreude. Then have a conversation about winterization and why it’s not currently mandatory for generator plants. Extra credit if she can tell you what the Railroad Commission actually regulates. Hint: not trains..
