Houston Chronicle: “While President Joe Biden moves to expand the use of renewable energy nationwide, the Texas Legislature is doing the opposite, adding fees on solar and wind electricity production in the state in hopes of boosting fossil fuels. Among the reforms of the state’s electric grid following last month’s deadly winter storms, Republicans in the Texas Senate have included new fees aimed at solar and wind companies that Democrats warn would damage the state’s standing as a national leader on renewable energy production, particularly wind power. State Sen. Charles Schwertner, R-Georgetown, said while wind and solar have expanded in Texas, those are ‘unreliable’ sources of energy because they cannot be called up at a moment’s notice during an emergency like the freeze in February. To correct that, Schwertner said his bill will give the state’s grid monitor authority to create fees for solar and wind. As it stands now, he said billions of dollars in federal subsidies to wind and solar companies have ’tilted’ the market too much to benefit those sources of energy, and he aims to re-balance it. Yet fossil fuels also receive government subsidies of roughly $20 billion a year, according to some estimates.”

“Democrats in the Senate say raising fees on green energy would be a step in the wrong direction for a state that has done well in developing wind and solar. Over the last decade, renewable energy has surged past coal and nuclear power to become the state’s second-leading source of electrical power, after natural gas, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. ‘This section could actually be detrimental to renewables,’ said State Sen. José Menéndez, D-San Antonio. The fees are included in a bill that is the most wide-ranging response yet to pass the Texas Senate dealing with the power outages from the winter storms.”