State lawmakers have pushed bills to support fossil fuel-burning power plants and restrict renewable energy development this legislative session.
Energy
In-depth reporting on oil, gas, renewable power, and policies shaping the future of energy in Texas from The Texas Tribune.
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Texas Legislature 2023
Texas has gone big with renewable energy. Why can’t it go all the way?
The biggest barriers to making Texas’ power grid 100% renewable have little to do with politics.
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Texas Legislature 2023
House approves bill capping what Texas consumers would pay for new tool to boost power plants
Senate Bill 7 would limit how much electricity customers could end up paying if the state opts to use performance credits, which would give the money to power generators in hopes they’ll add more power to the state grid.
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Texas Legislature 2023
Economic incentives clear Senate committee as negotiations continue
Lawmakers are trying hard to come up with an agreement on how to replace an embattled 20-year tax abatement program for big companies that expired in December.
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Texas Legislature 2023
Texas House’s weekend off means key Senate bills die after missing a legislative deadline
Priority bills that died include a 10-year minimum sentencing for gun-related crimes, a ban on “critical race theory” at public universities and LGBTQ-related legislation. While the bills may be dead, lawmakers have a limited time to attach their ideas to legislation that is still alive.
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Economy
Texas leaders want a new way to attract businesses here. But they can’t agree on how to do it.
The two chambers have 10 days to cut a deal before the end of the legislative session, and they are miles apart on some of the very foundations of a corporate tax-abatement bill considered to be a priority for Republican state leaders.
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Texas Legislature 2023
Bill to give companies low-interest loans to build more gas-fired power plants is approved by House committee
The bill marks the Legislature’s turn toward supporting natural gas-fueled electricity after the deadly winter storm in 2021.
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Energy
Houston-area chemical fire highlights gaps in Texas environmental enforcement
A fire broke out at a Deer Park Shell plant the day after a public hearing on renewing the permit for ITC, a nearby facility that caught fire in 2019, sparking a Texas Tribune/Public Health Watch investigation that documented failures in state and federal oversight.
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Energy
Shell refinery unit in Deer Park had history of malfunctions before fire
Recent “upsets” like tripped compressors, pressure loss and freezing weather resulted in thousands of pounds of unauthorized pollution but no fines or citations from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.
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Broken Pipes
Texas likely will spend billions fixing its water systems. Will it reach these forgotten colonias?
An estimated 500,000 people live in thousands of colonias along the Texas-Mexico border. Largely built between the 1950s and 1980s, these communities have been promised water — but it has never come.