Toby Howell
๐ค SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
We're getting temperature and tornado warnings.
So even the southern states weren't fully spared.
I want to dive into where the power industry is kind of how it's facing in this massive storm, because obviously when cold temperatures hit, power demands on the power grid go up dramatically.
And who is stepping up to the plate right now?
It's mostly traditional fossil fuels like oil and natural gas.
The largest grid operators were relying on natural gas for about 30% of their power yesterday.
And that has caused this crazy spike in natural gas prices as well.
Futures prices for natural gas jumped 70% in the US over the last week of trading.
And it's only going to get worse as, you know, gas producing parts of the United States are facing these really low temperatures and demand is only going to keep spiking.
I was looking into some natural gas traders were also saying, how can we stay online during this crazy event?
They were holing up in hotels to ensure that they still had connection to the Intercontinental Exchange so they could trade their natural gas future prices.
So it was interesting that there was like a weatherization of the actual natural gas grid and the actual electric grid and also the people that were trading on those exact things that were powering the grid as well.
So Texas was definitely...
people were looking, would they be able to handle this a little bit better?
And it does seem like they are handling it a little better.
Here's why I was laughing at you is instead of being glued to plow NYC, I went for a run, Neil.
I just saw the city streets myself and I could report there was a lot of snow to no one's surprise.
But it was fascinating to see how New York was handling the situation.
They equipped garbage trucks with snow plows and these things were just cooking down the road, just blowing snow everywhere, clearing the roads for everyone.
And one last anecdote on this too about New York City.