ERCOT issues weather watch ahead of potential for hard freezes early next week
An arctic cold front is expected to arrive Sunday night. The potential for a hard freeze would be Monday and Tuesday nights.
HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- A weather watch has been issued ahead of freezing temperatures in southeast Texas early next week.
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT, said the watch will be in effect from Monday, Jan. 15 through Wednesday, Jan. 17.
The weather watch is issued when there's the potential for higher electrical demand and lower reserves due to significant weather conditions such as extreme heat or, in this case, freezing.
According to ABC13's weather team, an arctic cool-down early next week is expected to plunge temperatures into the 20s, creating a possible hard freeze.
The arctic cold front is expected to arrive Sunday night. The potential for a hard freeze would be Monday and Tuesday nights.
But at this time, the probability of frozen precipitation remains low.
ERCOT said it's expecting grid conditions to be normal. You can monitor the conditions in real-time on the ERCOT website.
ERCOT runs the state's power grid, though it does not actually cover all of Texas.
The grid's reliability has been top of mind for at least three years, following the historic February 2021 freeze when Texans faced 44 hours of straight freezing temperatures.
The storm also brought snow, a low of 13 degrees, and a zero-degree wind chill, leaving millions without electricity and clean water for days, even weeks.
In all, 246 people died.
The freeze early next week would be our first hard freeze since Christmas week in 2022.
