Study: New Texas Power Plants Would Cost More than Cutting Energy Waste in Buildings

Washington, DC—Texas policymakers could tackle spiking summer and winter power demands while reducing—not raising—overall costs to households and businesses, according to a new report. Incentivizing energy-saving upgrades in homes and commercial buildings and rewarding electric customers for voluntarily shifting some energy use to off-peak hours would reduce peak electrical demand and improve grid reliability at a far lower cost than building new, subsidized power plants, the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE) study finds. Individual households would see average monthly net savings of about $13 on their electric bills.