Texas’ sixth largest wind production in world costs taxpayers and consumers billions

Critics argue Texas’ lead in the wind industry, which includes wind facilities, turbine manufacturers and financiers, is enabling large energy corporations to profit at the taxpayers’ expense. The state and some energy companies argue the implementation of wind energy from sparsely populated West Texas to the densely populated, higher energy using East Texas, was an unprecedented undertaking implemented by multiple stakeholders within a short timeframe. If Texas were a country, its installed wind power capacity would be the sixth largest in the world. The bulk of wind power comes from West Texas, nearly 12,000 MW, followed by the Panhandle (4,200 MW), coastal (3,000 MW), north (1,300 MW) and south (2,300 MW) load zones. In total, the ERCOT manages nearly 80,000 MW of installed wind capacity. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, only China, the United States, Germany, India and Spain produce more wind power than Texas’ installed wind capacity (16,000 MW). Wind surpassed coal in generating electricity in 2017, according to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which manages the flow of electric power to more than 25 million Texas customers, or about 90 percent of the state’s electric load. ERCOT connects more than 46,500 miles of transmission lines and 650-plus generation units.