Gov. Greg Abbott demands answers as parts of Texas remain without power

Utility-Workers-Texas Utility crews work to restore electricity in Houston, Thursday, July 11, 2024. Officials say about 500,000 customers still won't have electricity into next week as wide outages from Hurricane Beryl persist. (AP Photo/Lekan Oyekanmi)

Luke 21:11 There will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and pestilences. And there will be terrors and great signs from heaven.

Important Takeaways:

  • With around 270,000 homes and businesses still without power in the Houston area almost a week after Hurricane Beryl hit Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott on Sunday said he’s demanding an investigation into the response of the utility that serves the area as well as answers about its preparations for upcoming storms.
  • “Power companies along the Gulf Coast must be prepared to deal with hurricanes, to state the obvious,” Abbott said
  • While CenterPoint Energy has restored power to about 2 million customers, the slow pace of recovery has put the utility, which provides electricity to the nation’s fourth-largest city, under mounting scrutiny over whether it was sufficiently prepared for the storm that left people without air conditioning in the searing summer heat.
  • Abbott said he was sending a letter to the Public Utility Commission of Texas requiring it to investigate why restoration has taken so long and what must be done to fix it.
  • With months of hurricane season left, Abbott said he’s giving CenterPoint until the end of the month to specify what it’ll be doing to reduce or eliminate power outages in the event of another storm.
  • A post Sunday on CenterPoint’s website from its president and CEO, Jason Wells, said that over 2,100 utility poles were damaged during the storm and over 18,600 trees had to be removed from power lines, which impacted over 75% of the utility’s distribution circuits.

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