Although it’s very warm here in the East, it’s not brutally hot as it is in Texas and other parts of the Southwest. Back in March, Texas Governor Abbott wrote a letter to President Biden defending reliance on fossil fuels and criticizing a focus on clean energy. Abbott signed a bill prohibiting state contracts with companies that boycott fossil fuel companies.
However, now in the really brutal heat, it’s the clean energy of solar that is keeping the air conditioners of Texas running. In fact, without solar, Texas would have an energy deficit, a fancy way of saying, no air conditioning. Companies like Duke Energy with its Rambler Solar Project as well as many others are making sure that Texans don’t end up like fried eggs on the sidewalk.
Called unreliable by the oil and gas industry, solar power is growing exponentially, especially welcome even in conservative West Texas, now second only to California in its reliance on solar power. Time to change the thinking from old paradigms to new.
Prayer for the Day
Renew our spirits, O God, and open our minds to new truths,
Helping us to be receptive to the life you extend to all;
Center our lives in you, O God, for you are the center of all life,
A light of life in a world dark with violence and death.
Help us to hold fast to your steadfast love,
So we may share it with all whom we meet.
In the name of the One who gives us life in God,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
It’s a huge irony. The growth of wind and solar is because Texas is more capitalistic than many other states, so the response from the so-called capitalists in Austin was socialism — having the state invest $10 billion” in natural gas.
- John Berger, CEO, Sunnova Energy, a solar power company based in Houston
Solar is producing 15 percent of total energy right now. It’s definitely ruffling some feathers.
- Joshua Rhodes, research scientist, UTexas Austin
You, O Lord, cut openings for springs and torrents, dried up ever flowing streams; Yours is the day, yours also the night, establishing luminaries and the sun. You have fixed all the bounds of the earth; you have made summer and winter.
Psalm 74: 15-17