| | MustReadTexas.com – @MustReadTexas
BY: @MattMackowiak | Subscribe to the daily email here | | FRIDAY || 1/3/25 | | Good Friday mid day.
Thank you for reading as a FREE subscriber. | » Become a PAID subscriber for $7/mo or $70/yr here to SAVE TIME and be BETTER INFORMED. | | “If something of importance is known in Texas, Matt knows it. With a decline in the number of credible news organizations, the Must Read Texas morning email is indispensable for anyone that wants to continue to be informed.” – Former U.S. Senator Phil Gramm (R-TX) | | AUSTIN NEWSLETTER LAUNCHED | Are you one of the 100,000+ subscribers to ATX Pulse, a newsletter that delivers EVERYTHING you NEED TO KNOW about Austin? | | Subscriptions are $5/mo, $50/yr or $199/lifetime here: ATXpulsepremium.com. | » Read this morning's (free) edition here. | >> SUBSCRIBE HERE: ATXpulsepremium.com. ($5/mo or $50/yr or $199 lifetime) | | | “Texas Supreme Court to review Winter Storm Uri claims against utility companies,” Texas Lawbook's Janet Elliott — “With state electric grid operators eyeing the potential for extreme cold this winter, the Texas Supreme Court has agreed to hear a petition from transmission and distribution utility companies seeking dismissal of gross negligence and intentional nuisance claims over devastating winter storm blackouts in February 2021.
Justices will hear arguments Feb. 19, four years after Winter Storm Uri caused widespread, prolonged power outages resulting in deaths and property damage.
The court will review an April decision by a three-judge panel of the Fourteenth Court of Appeals in Houston that more than 15,000 plaintiffs may move forward with certain claims in their wrongful death, personal injury and other Uri-related lawsuits seeking billions of dollars in damages.
The Fourteenth Court said the utility companies were entitled to dismissal of the plaintiffs’ claims for negligence because Texas law does not impose common-law negligence duties associated with emergency power interruptions, ensuring adequate generation or warning of anticipated power outages. | » BECOME A PAID SUBSCRIBER: $7/mo | But the court of appeals said that the tariff, which is essentially the state-law mandated contract between customers and the transmission and distribution companies, does allow for gross negligence and intentional nuisance claims.
More than 200 lawsuits, consolidated into multidistrict litigation before Harris County MDL Court Judge Sylvia Matthews, allege that mismanagement by companies including Dallas-based Oncor Electric Delivery, CenterPoint Energy in Houston and American Electric Power constituted an intentional nuisance.
Uri was a perfect storm for the electric grid that serves most of Texas as plunging temperatures sparked record high demand amid a severely reduced energy supply, causing the grid to become unbalanced. Beginning at 1:25 a.m. on Feb. 15, 2021, ERCOT began ordering the utilities to cut service to set amounts of customer demand to prevent the grid from collapsing. | » BECOME A PAID SUBSCRIBER: $70/yr | Millions of Texans lost heat and power for several days as the weather remained brutally cold. News reports have attributed nearly 250 deaths to the disaster.
The transmission and distribution companies say they could be the only category of the many entities involved in the crisis to have a legal duty to deliver electricity after court rulings in other Uri-related cases went in favor of natural gas providers, power generators, retail electric providers and ERCOT defendants.
Michael A. Heidler, an appellate partner at Vinson & Elkins, said in the companies’ petition for review that the Supreme Court should bar the plaintiffs’ claims before significant resources are spent adjudicating “15,000 claimants’ baseless complaints.”
“In these exigent circumstances, no court has imposed common-law duties on TDUs [transmission and distribution utilities] to supply electricity to any particular customers for any particular duration. Established Texas law confirms that courts should not impose such a duty in these circumstances. Plaintiffs’ gross-negligence claim should be dismissed,” Heidler wrote.
He said the companies did not create a nuisance by shedding load in response to ERCOT’s orders. Citing a 2016 Texas Supreme Court pipeline case, Heidler said that “nuisance” is a condition such as smoke, gases or odors that substantially interferes with use and enjoyment of land.
“Here, the ‘condition’ interfering with use and enjoyment of land was cold air. But it was Mother Nature — not TDUs — that blew cold air onto Plaintiffs’ properties,” Heidler said.
In a response for plaintiff Bernadine Edwards, Dallas lawyer S. Ann Saucer said the utilities are not being sued for complying with ERCOT’s load shed orders but because they committed malfeasance that ERCOT did not order.
“TDUs are not being sued because they failed to deliver uninterrupted adequate power but because they, either intentionally or via gross negligence, created part of the power shortfall, told untruths to their customers, and then deprived their misled customers of power for undue stretches of time rather than roll blackouts, with catastrophic results including deaths,” said Saucer, who is with Nachawati Law Group.
The utility companies are being supported with briefs from the industry and other business groups." Texas Lawbook | | FREE SUBSCRIPTIONS HAVE ENDED: As of July 11, 2022, we have moved to a paywall for free subscribers. Free subscribers will only receive the top story in their morning email. Free subscribers will need to become paid subscribers to receive full story summaries. | | DMN: “Texas' grid could connect to New Mexico if company's request is approved” DMN ($) | AAS: “Medicaid whistleblowers awarded $37 million from state in 13-year-old case against Xeroz” AAS ($) | SAEN: “Inside high-pressure sales culture of Texas' solar energy boom” SAEN ($) | HOU CHRON: “Trump's 'border czar' has ties to Texas. Here's what to know” Houston Chronicle ($) | | | > FWST: "‘Trust turned into terror’ as correctional officer sexually abused Texas inmates, feds say" FWST
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> NHL: Dallas 4, Ottawa 2
> NCAAM: Marshall 77, Texas State 71
> NCAAM: New Mexico State 75, Sam Houston State 71
> NCAAM: UTEP 70, Louisiana Tech 60
This weekend's Texas sports schedule:
Fri
> 3pm: NCAAF: North Texas at Texas State (ESPN)
> 7pm: NBA: Boston at Houston
> 7:30pm: NBA: Cleveland at Dallas
> 8pm: NBA: San Antonio at Denver
Sat
> 12pm: NCAAM: Texas State at Appalachian State (ESPN+)
> 1pm: NCAAM: #25 Baylor at #3 Iowa State (CBS)
> 1pm: NCAAM: Charlotte at Rice (ESPN+)
> 1:15pm: NCAAM: #4 Duke at SMU (CW)
> 3pm: NCAAM: Kansas State at TCU (CBS Sports)
> 3:30pm: NCAAM: Texas A&M-Commerce at SE Louisiana (ESPN+)
> 4:30pm: NCAAM: Grambling State at Prairie View A&M (ESPN+)
> 5pm: NCAAM: UT-RGV at New Orleans (ESPN+)
> 5pm: NCAAM: Incarnate Word at Texas Southern (ESPN+)
> 5pm: NCAAM: UTSA at Tulane (ESPNU)
> 6pm: NCAAM: Houston Christian at Lamar (ESPN+)
> 6pm: NCAAM: Texas Tech at Utah (ESPN+)
> 7pm: NBA: Denver at San Antonio
> 7pm: NHL: Utah at Dallas (ESPN+)
> 7pm: NCAAM: Texas at #13 Texas A&M (SEC Network)
> 7pm: NCAAM: UT-Arlington at Tarleton State (ESPN+)
> 8pm: NCAAM: Sam Houston State at UTEP (ESPN+)
Sun
> 12pm: NFL: Washington at Dallas (Fox)
> 12pm: NFL: Houston at Tennessee (CBS)
> 4pm: NCAAM: North Texas at #21 Memphis (ESPN)
> 6pm: NBA: LA Lakers at Houston
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