Texas’ Wobbly Power Grid Spurs DFW Airport to Map Backup Plans

(Bloomberg) -- Dallas Fort Worth International, the world’s second-busiest airport, is building its own electric capacity amid concerns the Texas’ grid will continue to be plagued by power crises.

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The plans include construction of a new utility plant as well as a solar-powered microgrid, said DFW International Chief Executive Officer Sean Donohue. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, known as Ercot, oversees the power infrastructure that serves the vast majority of Texas’ 30 million residents.

“One of the challenges we’ve identified in the future is will Ercot be able to keep up with our power requirements,” Donohue said during an interview with Bloomberg on Wednesday. “As we forecast our power needs at the airport, they could double in the next five to 10 years.”

Ercot has for years struggled to maintain power deliveries to homes and businesses across the second-largest US state during heatwaves and winter storms that spike demand. Break-neck population growth has strained the grid’s ability to cope several times in recent years, including a deadly February 2021 disaster that shut off lights, heat and water for millions of residents for the better part of a week.

DFW’s new central utility plant will be fully electric and designed to meet increased demand as it constructs a new terminal and tears down and rebuilds another, Donohue said. The solar-powered microgrid at its rental-car center will be capable of supercharging EVs in a short time.

The airport is working toward electrifying its fleet of about 200 ground vehicles, and expects airlines probably will do the same, Donohue said. As many as 40,000 vehicles are parked at the sprawling airport daily, plus a fleet of roughly 30,000 rentals, he said. Even if just 25% of the parked cars are electric vehicles in seven years, that’ll mean 10,000 potentially in need of charging. DFW also is planning for a future that may include electrified flying taxis ferrying travelers to the airport.

“Obviously, battery technology needs to improve so we can store power, but we’re going to make some investments so that we buy down a little bit of the risk on what we’re going to draw from Ercot,” he said.

For the past seven years, all of the power purchased by the airport has been wind-generated, saving millions in electricity costs, Donohue said.

--With assistance from Joe Carroll.

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