In this last week of the current Texas Legislature, it’s a complicated, tricksy end game to see if bills harmful to Texas air, water, clean energy and consumer choice will become law. 

May 27, 2015

The 84th Texas Legislature resembles a giant, two-sided game of Whac-a-Mole. That old State Fair midway game where toy moles pop up madly out of holes all over the board, and you whack them down to win the prize. 

In the Lege, the majority have been whacking down current protections on public health, safety and natural resources. Established law and policy have felt the hammer, from cities’ rights to create ordinances within their limits (damaged by HB 40), to citizens’ rights to request hearings on environmentally sensitive projects and meaningful penalties on polluters. Meanwhile, progressives and environmentalists are counter whacking – now at bill HB 2595, which attacks cities’ home-rule power to accept voter-initiated referendum or ballot initiative (See Green Source DFW article) and at a stealth amendment to SB 1926 that would roll back Texas’ booming renewable energy program.

With this stealth move, the end-of-session Whac-a-Mole game has targeted the biggest, job-creating, small-town-saving success story in Texas renewable energy:  wind power. 

And it has morphed into hide-and-seek, in which controversial bill sections are hidden in other bills via last-minute amendments, to get past legislators who don't have time to read them.

At press time, HB 2595 was pending final approval in a Senate committee, and SB 1926 was due to return to the House. You still have the chance to weigh in.

GONE WITH THE WIND?

“If Texas were an independent country, our wind power would rank fifth behind China, India, Spain and Germany,” says Mark Armentrout, energy expert and past board chair of ERCOT, which operates Texas’ power grid. 

Texas’ wind energy capacity is more than double that of the next state, California. 

In 1999, when Texas established its Renewable Energy Portfolio Standard for utilities, our installed wind capacity was only 180 MW (mega watts.)  

By 2014, it was 87 times that—almost 16,000 MW.  Enough to power 4.8 million average-sized U.S. homes, per Andrew Swift of the National Wind Institute at Texas Tech University.

What kicked this growth rate into overdrive in 2005 was a bill that doubled the portfolio standard and added a program called Competitive Renewable Energy Zones, or CREZ, to promote construction of transmission lines.

CREZ lines are “like an eight-lane superhighway compared to a dirt road,” says Tom “Smitty” Smith, director of citizen advocacy group Public Citizen. "Most wind power plants are connected by tiny power lines."

"In the 8 years after CREZ …3,600 miles of new transmission lines have been completed that will serve about 18.5 gigawatts of power,” says Warren Lasher, system planning director for ERCOT.

“It's the reason why Texas wind farms are outpacing the rest of the U.S.’ growth in renewables… We get calls from all over the world, how did we do this? They're surprised it's Texas doing it," says David Power of Public Citizen. 

"CREZ was really thoughtful about the long term, especially for the good of rural areas of the state. It's one of the best rural development programs in generations.

"When we visit small West Texas towns, the mayor and economic development people say, ‘Thank God for this program, it allows people to (have jobs and) stay…it helped us build a school."

What may gut CREZ from the state’s renewable standards is a bill sponsored by that very same senator, Troy Fraser (R-Horseshoe Bend) who helped carefully craft it 10 years ago.

Fraser’s SB 931 was cut down to an amendment, passed around the Lege and is now attached to a semi-related bill, HB 1926. It’s hide-and-seek, remember? HB 1926 now goes back to the House for consideration of its Senate amendments. If the sponsor of HB 1926 accepts the CREZ-killing amendment, it becomes law as part of the already-approved bill.

If HB 1926’s sponsor refuses the amendment, a House vote can overrule him.  

The amendment can be stripped, dismissed as not germane to the bill, or refused by the conference committee. Lobbyists for citizen groups and for industry are hard at work.

“Billions of dollars in new capital investment in West Texas renewable production would be lost,” says North.  

Also, transmission lines permits already in queue to move energy from existing plants would be affected. And huge public and private investment in existing plants would not yield the payoff for which it was intended.

Why did Troy Fraser, the senator with the golden Midas touch for renewables, put on a black glove and apply the Whac-a-Mole mallet to the brainchild he sponsored?

According to Lobby Watch, Sen. Fraser received more than $111,000 from oil and gas interests in the 2013-2014 funding cycle, almost double the Senate average of $56,000. The research project of watchdog group Texans for Public Justice notes,  “Oil and gas supplied 19 percent of his latest war chest."  

Senators received a total of $1.7 million from the industry. House and Senate contributions combined totaled $5 million for the two-year period.

Buys a lot of rounds of Whac-a-Mole. 

CITIZEN ACTION

To express your view on renewable energy in Texas and “CREZ transmission” amendments that would gut its transmission, contact:

Speaker of the House: Joe Straus

Your representative: Who Represents Me?

To speak out on HB 2595 (See Green Source  DFW article):

Contact your representative: Who Represents Me?

Talking points are available at: Alliance for a Clean Texas – A citizen advocacy alliance of 15 environmental, public interest, consumer rights and faith groups.

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