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Green lights indicate Wednesday, Feb. 2, 2022 if a freeze protection circuit is working at one of the power generation units at CPS?•s Braunig Power Station. CPS Energy has installed a number of the heat trace freeze protection circuits since last year?•s power system collapse.

Rick Urrutia, the interim vice president of generation operations at CPS Energy, stands Wednesday, Feb. 2, 2022 in front of a temporary insulating structure at one of the power generation units at CPS?•s Braunig Power Station. Though CPS has used temporary insulation for portions of their generation plants for many years, the city-owned utility has increased the number of those insulating structures after last year?•s power grid collapse, according to Urrutia.

Live Updates: 30,000 without power, highway closures and more

As freezing temperatures and rain pushed closer to San Antonio on Wednesday — dredging up memories of long, harrowing power outages nearly a year ago — CPS Energy said it’s ready this time.

Since Winter Storm Uri, the city-owned utility has spent $2 million to better prepare its power plants for prolonged periods of freezing temperatures.

“I don’t want our community to be fearful that CPS Energy is not doing everything we can to be prepared,” interim CEO Rudy Garza said. “We’re ready for extreme events of this nature.”

As fog rolled across Braunig Lake in Southeast Bexar County, insulated fabric clung to machinery at CPS’ nearby power station — tent-like enclosures with infrared space heaters. They’ll shield plant components, such as an air compressor feeding into a natural gas-fired unit, from the cold.

On ExpressNews.com: ‘Absolutely in better shape’: CPS Energy touts work done since February’s deep freeze, blackout

A few feet away, a green light turned on above an insulated pipe, letting CPS operators know that a circuit was heating the line. The utility has added heating elements to more exposed pipes at its seven plants.

A year ago, plant workers had no way of knowing if sections of piping were freezing up. Now they do.

During Winter Storm Uri, CPS Energy’s power plants operated at only 85 percent capacity. The nuclear plant the utility co-owns in South Texas seized up when a sensor froze. CPS’ Spruce coal plant and some of its gas-fired plants — including the Braunig Power Station — weren’t fully operating.

Discussing this week’s arctic blast, Garza said, “We’ve got more generation than we need to serve our community.”

The National Weather Service has forecast freezing rain in the San Antonio area on Thursday, with temperatures dropping to the low-20s Friday morning.

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, the state’s grid operator, said it inspected weatherization measures at more than 300 power plants ahead of this week’s expected freeze. ERCOT found deficiencies in three Texas plants; CPS said its facilities weren’t among them.

ERCOT officials said they don’t expect to call for rolling blackouts as temperatures drop this week, and that more power-generation capacity is in reserve than during last year’s deep freeze.

“While grid conditions remain strong with enough capacity, our weather forecasts show there is potential for significant frozen precipitation behind this week’s cold front,” ERCOT interim CEO Brad Jones said. “ERCOT is using all the tools available to manage the grid effectively during this winter weather.”

Rick Urrutia, left, the interim vice president of generation operations at CPS Energy, stands Wednesday, Feb. 2, 2022 with Shane Bemis, CPS Energy?•s Braunig Power Station plant director, next to some temporary insulating structures at one of the power generation units at CPS?•s Braunig Power Station. Though CPS has used temporary insulation for portions of their generation plants for many years, the city-owned utility has increased the number of those insulating structures after last year?•s power grid collapse, according to Urrutia.

Garza said heavy precipitation in San Antonio could make it “difficult to move around” the city, and — if the cold front is worse than expected — ice and heavy wind could topple trees or snap power lines, causing local outages.

“Typically, in a really bad wind storm, we may have 20,000 to 30,000 customers out at any given time,” Garza said. “We’re going to have to be on our game with the cold snap coming in to try to get those addressed as soon as possible.”

CPS has revamped the program it uses to roll blackouts throughout the city if ERCOT once again calls on CPS to cut off customers’ power and send it onto the state grid, Garza said. If another power crunch hits San Antonio this week, the utility’s goal is to turn off customers’ power for no more 15 minutes at a time.

During last year’s storm, more than 250,000 CPS customers were without power for at least 24 hours. Another 25,000 lost electricity for more than 48 hours that week.

CPS distributes electricity through about 700 circuits across its service area, with most serving several thousand households and businesses.

Before Winter Storm Uri, about two-thirds of those circuits were considered “uninterruptible,” meaning CPS had to keep power flowing to them even when ERCOT orders the utility to conduct rolling blackouts. Located in those circuit areas are hospitals, military installations, police and fire stations and other facilities that have to stay in operation during emergencies.

Customers who live within these circuit areas likely spent less time without power a year ago than others.

CPS said 155 of its circuits are now considered “interruptible.” In other words, the utility has more areas where it can cut power if ERCOT orders outages, spreading them out more evenly in its area — resulting in shorter periods without electricity.

“The experience that our customers would see in a Uri event is a lot different” now, said Richard Medina, CPS’ executive in charge of power delivery.

On ExpressNews.com: Bond rating agency downgrades CPS Energy debt, but lifts outlook on utility’s future

Since last winter, CPS also has bolstered its supply of natural gas, which it pumps into households for heating and burns at five of its seven power plants to generate electricity.

Before last year’s winter storm, CPS purchased about 30 percent of its gas under longer-term contracts at fixed prices. CPS purchased the rest of its gas on the Texas spot market as needed, where prices swing up and down.

Last year, CPS needed to purchase large amounts of natural gas ahead of the freeze, and was forced to spend nearly $700 million on the spot market for the fuel. That’s about how much CPS spends on natural gas in a year.

This year, CPS has paid to store more gas supplies and hedge against rising prices.

“We’ve pulled every lever we have to be able to manage the risks,” Garza said.

Diego Mendoza-Moyers is a business reporter covering energy, manufacturing and labor. A native of El Paso, he has previously written for the Albany Times Union, Las Vegas Review-Journal and Arizona Republic. He graduated from Arizona State University with a B.A. in journalism. Call Diego at 210-250-3165 or email diego.mendoza-moyers@express-news.net