Texas Winter Storm Victims Won't Have To Pay Millions In Electric Bills

It appears Texans be forgiven millions of dollars in electric bills due to the winter storm disaster that barreled down in February, thanks to Attorney General Ken Paxton.

Paxton released a statement on Tuesday saying, “My office sued Griddy Energy, under the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act, to hold them accountable for their escalation of last month’s winter storm disaster by debiting enormous amounts from customer accounts as Texans struggled to survive the storm.”

Griddy Energy filed for bankruptcy protection on Monday and is looking to emerge from Chapter 11 in 80 days.

Paxton said that about 24,000 former customers of Griddy Energy owe $29.1 million in unpaid electric bills.

Through the bankruptcy restructuring, Griddy is expected to release all outstanding payment obligations for customers in Texas that were financially unable to pay their energy bills as a result of the absorbent costs they were charged during the unprecedented storm.

Paxton said in his statement that Griddy will also work in “good faith” to resolve the matters in the Texas court system and the Civil Investigate Demand while addressing relief for those residents that have already paid their bills.

The electric company has attributed its bankruptcy to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which CEO Michael Fallquist said: “destroyed our business and caused financial harm to our customers."

“Our bankruptcy plan, if confirmed, provides relief for our former customers who were unable to pay their electricity bills resulting from the unprecedented prices. ERCOT made a bad situation worse for our customers by continuing to set prices at $9,000 per megawatt hour-long after firm load shed instructions had stopped. Our customers paid 300 times more than the normal price for electricity during this period."

"Griddy did not profit from the winter storm crisis,” he added.

Many Texas residents were hit with significantly high energy bills in February as severe winter storms swept through the region, knocking out power in the state. Dozens of people died in Texas and surrounding states as many froze to death without power for several days.

According to officials, frozen machinery at natural gas plants resulted in power outages, The Hill reported.

Gov. Greg Abbott supported the move by Paxton, saying in a Twitter post on Tuesday, “I will continue working with the legislature to resolve remaining claims.”