Sean Hannity and Texas governor blame solar power and wind power for energy blackouts in Texas

Total lies

Written by Media Matters Staff

Published

From the February 16, 2021, edition of Fox News' Hannity

SEAN HANNITY (HOST): I don't have a problem. I'm going to be very clear, I'm an all-of-the-above guy. Anything that works, I'm all for. Cheap energy, I'm all for, but that would include the lifeblood of the world's economy, gas, oil, old-fashioned oil, and coal. I'm not against nuclear energy either. I'm not against wind turbines. But my question is, if you have these rolling blackouts and you've got freezing weather, I mean -- and they're not reliable, and it's use it or lose it, what good is it? 

GOV. GREG ABBOTT (GUEST): Sean, this shows how the Green New Deal would be a deadly deal for the United States of America. Texas is blessed with multiple sources of energy such as natural gas and oil and nuclear, as well as solar and wind. But you saw, from what Trace said, and that is our wind and our solar got shut down and they were collectively more than 10% of our power grid. And that thrust Texas into a situation where it was lacking power in a statewide basis, that was power that was spread out by that ERCOT organization that you were talking about. As a result, it just shows that fossil fuel is necessary for the state of Texas, as well as other states.

As Media Matters and many others have pointed out, these are complete and total lies.

Sorry but this is utterly psychotic. There’s an emergency in Texas *right now* and he’s dunking on the Green New Deal with complete lies about the source of the problem. https://t.co/PNzzr6juAR

— Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes) February 17, 2021

It needs to be LOUDLY emphasized that this is a lie. Wind and solar power actually overperformed expected winter capacity in Texas. The state was crippled by frozen coal and gas plants, knocking out over 30 gigawatts of power. Sources below. https://t.co/qn9O6OJN3V

— Respectable Lawyer (@RespectableLaw) February 17, 2021