Communications staff from ERCOT and the Public Utility Commission told commissioners Thursday that they are working together to improve their practices and messages after February’s near collapse of the grid led to long-term outages, hundreds of deaths and billions of dollars in damages.
“We realized we are dealing with a statewide populace that has been badly traumatized by the events of February,” Andrew Barlow, the PUC’s director of external affairs, said during the commission’s open meeting Thursday.
He told commissioners that while social media are positive channels, the legacy print and broadcast media are “the best [way] to deliver information to the people of Texas.” Barlow said communications staffers will engage directly with the “critical reporters” in the state’s key markets to ensure they’re up to speed with the language and protocols during any severe events this summer and into the future.
“We’re making sure … they’re fully informed and fully connected so they can communicate with their audiences,” Barlow said.
ERCOT was pilloried for its use of social media in the runup to the February winter storm. Informal Twitter messages and the use of industry jargon did not adequately prepare Texans for the possibility of power outages, critics said.
The grid operator has since brought on Chris Schein, a 20-year veteran of Texas’ electric industry, as its interim communications leader.
“It’s been my job to communicate clearly and concisely,” said Schein, who will mark his 30th day on the job Monday. “One of the things that we heard from February is that ERCOT needs to communicate more clearly, and so we’re implementing the practices and policies to do that.”
“After talking with the policymakers, it appears you guys are on the right track,” Commissioner Will McAdams said. “People are now familiar with ERCOT and the Public Utility Commission. We need to promulgate as many educational products as we can.”
Before the meeting, McAdams filed a memo saying he would recommend ending a storm-based disconnection moratorium during the PUC’s June 11 open meeting. His memo was supported by retail providers and several other companies (51812).
Thursday’s meeting was designed as a work session to discuss addressing the various energy-related bills that have come out of the Texas Legislature.
“At the very least, these interim workshop open meetings will provide a way to work through the actual details before the decision points come up,” McAdams said.
