Crack open a warm, un-refrigerated beer, Lubbock, because Texas has officially taken the crown. According to a depressing new federal report, the Lone Star State led the entire country in residential electricity shutoffs, racking up over 3 million disconnections. We also swept the competition in natural gas shutoffs, because why settle for just being hot and dark when you can be cold and hungry too? Nothing says “Texas Pride” quite like sitting in a pitch-black living room sweating through your shirt while the state brag about its thriving economy.
The numbers from the U.S. Energy Information Administration are a masterclass in Texas overachievement. We only make up about 9% of the nation’s electricity customers, yet we somehow accounted for a staggering 22.5% of all disconnections nationwide. Remember all those glossy mailers promising that our beautiful, deregulated free-market grid keeps prices cheap? Turns out the only thing cheap about it is the utter lack of mercy from the utility companies when you’re a few dollars short.
Naturally, the folks at the Texas Energy Poverty Research Institute note that things are only getting worse. Thanks to our rapid growth, extreme weather, and the desperate need to “harden” the grid after it spectacularly failed us, residential electricity prices jumped about 30% over the last few years. And get excited, because they’re projected to hike another 29% by 2030. Why? To help power the massive influx of AI data centers and crypto-mining operations. It’s comforting to know that while local families are skipping meals and medicine to keep the lights on, some tech bro’s Bitcoin rig is getting perfectly chilled, priority-access electricity.
To top it all off, the system is beautifully rigged to keep you down once you trip. According to the report, once your power gets cut, you lose access to the “affordable” plans and get hit with overdue balances and predatory fees just to get turned back on. In this corporate paradise, businesses are treated like royalty, and the rest of us are just peasants begging for a spark.
But hey, look on the bright side: when the ERCOT grid inevitably chokes and dies during the next major heatwave, those of us who got disconnected early will already be fully adapted to the dark ages. Isn’t the free market beautiful?
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