The Midnight Connection
May 4th, 1976 — Under the cover of night, a rogue power company in Texas decided that enough was enough. They wanted better than a power grid that was poorly regulated and they wanted better. On this night, they successfully proved that they could connect to the wider gride across the United States by sending people from Vernon, Texas to Altus, Oklahoma. So yes, Texas could send power and be combined into the federal power grid. So what happened?
Prior to this date, there was an informal (read: backroom deal and highly illegal except, for some reason, in the energy trading business) agreement among Texas-based utility companies that they weren’t going to join the Federal power grid. As soon as that connection happened, and it was proven that the federal power grid could work with the Texas one, companies abandoned the project. Why? Fear of regulation. Companies in Texas didn’t want to adhere themselves to the standards that the federal regulators put it in.
And what happened in 2021? There wasn’t an option to bring in power from outside of Texas to shore up the grid. 700+ People died.
