AUSTIN, Texas — When ERCOT requested Texans conserve power Monday afternoon, Susan Meyer did her duty: she raised her air conditioning thermostat from 75 to 80 degrees.
By Friday morning, her thermostat displayed her home's indoor temperature at 83 degrees.
"It's been hard. You can't go outside. You can't water enough. Everything is dying," Meyer said. "ERCOT, I think, has failed us again."
Meyer doesn't really use social media. She found out for the request for conservation by reading the paper Monday morning. Having to save power immediately brought her back to Winter Storm Uri from February 2021.
"I spend a lot of time just staying home, reading and that's the crazy thing is that's where I spent the winter when we had no power, snuggled up on the couch with my dog, with blankets on us. Now, again, because ERCOT just can't seem to get their act together, I'm back on the couch again," Meyer recounted.
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Meyer lives alone with her dog, Lucy. Her kids and grandkids live across Texas, so she notes she doesn't have people coming in and out of her home during the warm days letting air in and out. She keeps unnecessary lights turned off, leaves one overhead fan turned on in her living room, but otherwise is content to read books and relax with a glass of wine.
"I have one of those ACs that it's right behind this wall. It's not upstairs and it's not outside. Every time I walk past it, I put my hand on the wall and I say, 'Thank you,'" Meyer added, saying she counts her blessings.
This past week, her pastor, David Peters, checked in on Meyer, who's part of his Episcopalian congregation, and others in the Pflugerville community.
"I was a chaplain in the Iraq war, I was in the Army, and I never thought I'd have to be a chaplain for the apocalypse, for a climate apocalypse, and a lot of other things like a pandemic," Peters said. "For me, that has been a source of great anxiety."
Peters added his role as a pastor is to stand in that anxiety with people who need help getting through their own. Because of his military history, he has a personal connection to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
"Even if the power doesn't fail, it's kind of like thinking you might lose your job, can be pretty stressful even if you don't lose your job, always waiting for this other shoe to fall. With the power grid, to me, is that puts all of us in a state of anxiety," Peters said.
While Meyer said she can handle the conservation requests, she worries about fellow seniors who need the power available to them. She said even just doing household chores gets to her when she can't run her air conditioning at her normal settings.
"I don't have to cook very much, so I'm not heating up the kitchen," Meyer said. "Even if I do get up and sweep or clean, I'm sweating. So I'm sure it's much worse for others, but it's hard."
Meyer moved to her Pflugerville home in 1992, before it was booming with people and business. In 30 years, she can't remember summer heat like what we've seen recently.
"I looked at what it's going to be like this week, and I thought, 'Wait, I'm not seeing this right.' It's not 104, 106, 108, 102. I've never seen that. Maybe a one day of 102, but nothing like this," Meyer added.
Both Meyer and Peters hope for major changes from ERCOT to accommodate extreme weather and greater demand on the grid from the growth of Texas. Until then, they'll keep raising their thermostat temperatures to help keep the lights on across the state.
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